African Americans with Southern farming heritage bring farmers' market to Chicago's South Side

The south side of Chicago has become a magnet for African American farmers in Northern Illinois to sell fresh fruits and vegetables at an affordable price to mostly black residents. But the back story of how the markets came to be is a fascinating one, rich in tradition, Samuel Freedman reports for The New York Times. (NYT photo by Nathan Weber: T. C. Barker, 73, and his grandson, C. J. Dodd, 14)

Many of the sellers were born in the rural South, some into families that owned or worked farms, before circumstances (such as one family losing its land after the patriarch died with no will) forced them to move to Chicago as part of the great Northern Migration of black Southerners. After retiring from years working in the city, a handful decided to return to the country, buying property 60 miles south of Chicago in the Pembroke Township, which had been settled by freed slaves and is now home to a host of black farmers, Freedman writes. On Saturday mornings in the summer a small group sells their goods at the market, which is sponsored by one of Chicago’s most formidable black churches, Trinity United Church of Christ, which has 8,500 members, and once counted President Obama as a member.

"It helps support the precarious livelihood of the farmers, and it addresses the congregation’s need for fresh produce in an expanse of the South Side considered a 'food desert' for its paucity of supermarkets and greengrocers," Freedman writes. The market was created by the Rev. Otis Moss III and his wife Monica, "a mother of two with a fervent interest in health and wellness. She pointed out the difficulty that Trinity members and other neighborhood residents had finding fresh fruits and vegetables close by at affordable prices. On a typical summer Saturday, about 150 customers patronize the farmers, who make as much as $150 for a five-hour stint." (Read more)