Meet David Fryman, Floyd County’s first registered Home Grown by Heroes vet and Grow Appalachia participant among other things. While this is David’s first official year with the St. Vincent Mission Grow Appalachia program, he was in fact at the first meeting Sister Kathleen and David Cooke had in 2009 when David was looking for places to expand the fledgling Grow Appalachia program.
As well as being a Marine Corp veteran, our David is a farmer, artist and satirist. He farms in Minnie, Kentucky on family land but is also the “F” in Todd Howard’s HF Farm & Garden greenhouse enterprise and does beautiful carving and woodworking. Last week he brought a handmade punched tin pie safe to the Farmers’ Market along with his tomatoes, beans and zucchini. In addition to being farmer, he is a vendor at the Floyd County Farmers’ Market and works with the Big Sandy Community and Technical College group on their community garden as the Growing Warriors project manager. Oh, and then he has a full time job working third shift at Wal-Mart. David is hoping that his connection with Growing Warriors and his Homegrown by Heroes designation will let him retire one of those hats (we won’t say which one).
In case you haven’t heard of the Homegrown by Heroes program, here is a blurb from their website:
The Homegrown By Heroes marketing initiative will afford farmers and/or agricultural producers located within the Commonwealth of Kentucky and who have served in any of the branches of the United States Military (U.S. Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy and Coast Guard) the ability to use the Homegrown By Heroes logo on their agribusiness signage and/or agriculture products. This distinctive logo will serve as identification to prospective consumers that the products were locally grown or raised by a veteran. From the grocery shelf to the farmers’ market to on-line retail, this label will hopefully serve as an extra incentive to consumers when making a purchase decision.
Goals for Homegrown By Heroes
• Provide Kentucky farmers who served in the military distinctive marketing/branding power to their locally grown and raised agriculture products at the point of sale.
• Afford consumers the opportunity to identify agriculture products produced by Kentucky Proud veteran-farmers at the point of sale.
• Afford consumers the opportunity to support Kentucky Proud veteran-farmers by identifying and purchasing their agriculture products at the point of sale.
http://www.kyproud.com/veterans/
So now that you know about David and his Homegrown by Heroes designation, I bet you can think of other vet/farmers who could use this valuable marketing tool. Spread the word. And if you are in Floyd County on a Saturday between 9 and 2 come by the Market to see his work-both agricultural and artistic- listen to his wit and say thanks for his service.
David weaving tomatoes at his Minnie KY garden site
David showing Debbie Wallen how to do the Florida Weave
Look for this logo and support local agriculture and our men and women farmer veterans.
Glad to see the weave! Thank you for your service, David!
Congratulations to David Fryman and the St. Vincent Grow Appalachia site. Just another reason to be proud of your veterans and Grow Appalachia. We will check into this for our participants, thanks for the lead.
Valerie
Cowan Community Center GA Site
Welcome to the Grow Appalachia family, David. Thank you for your service. Isn’t it interesting how farming, art, and satire have a way of working so well together!
Congratulations to David! That is awesome and thanks for your service.
As an added note, Homegrown by Hero is working with the Farmer Veteran Coalition (FVC) and they are taking this marketing brand nationwide. So, while it started out as a KY program, now Veterans across the country can earn this certification. We have two in WV (that I know of). For more information, the FVC website is http://www.farmvetco.org.
BethAnn
WV Vets to Ag GA Site