Established 1826 — Oldest College Newspaper West of the Alleghenies

Oxford farmers market to see local collaboration

Residents Hedwig Dodds and her mom purchase lettuce from vendor Harv Roehling during the Oxford Farmers Market Uptown last September.
Residents Hedwig Dodds and her mom purchase lettuce from vendor Harv Roehling during the Oxford Farmers Market Uptown last September.

Chau Nguyen

Residents Hedwig Dodds and her mom purchase lettuce from vendor Harv Roehling during the Oxford Farmers Market Uptown last September.

This summer, the Oxford Parks and Recreation Department (OPRD) is joining forces with a local tradition for the first time to host special events in an effort to bring community and freshness to the same table.

All to be located in the Uptown Park, OPRD will host special events during the Oxford Farmers Market Uptown (OFMU) every third Saturday of the month. Beginning in May and running through September, the OPRD events will run from 10 a.m. until 11:30 a.m. as a part of the Saturdays at the Market program.

Additionally, located in the parking lot at the corner of Main and High streets across from the Uptown Park, the annual OFMU will kick off its summer season May 5. OFMU will operate from 7:30 a.m. until 11:30 a.m. every Saturday beginning in May through October, said OFMU Market Manager Larry Slocum.

OFMU will also have Tuesday Mini-Markets during those months, which will operate from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m.

"It's a natural partnership because you're going towards the same goals," said Derek Greene, TRI Community Center special events coordinator from OPRD. "It's all about building a sense of community and providing citizens with things to do during the summer."

The OPRD program will include educational and tasting events - such as tomato tasting - food preservation demonstrations, as well as a bread-and-spread, where visitors taste breads and jams produced locally, Greene said.

Saturdays at the Market will kick off May 19 with a children's gardening program, which will bring in knowledgeable community members to teach children and their families the process of producing food like those sold at the farmers market, Greene said.

According to Suzie Marcum, a member of the farmers market council, the opening day of the summer farmers market will include a petting zoo as well as a performance by the Oxford Drum and Gourd Ensemble.

Visitors can also expect live music, cooking contests and demonstrations from local chefs scheduled sporadically throughout the months the farmers market operates, Slocum said.

With the theme of cultivating community, Slocum said the

Enjoy what you're reading?
Signup for our newsletter

farmers market becomes a social gathering, bringing community members together to talk to farmers, buy goods and spend time together.

"(It is the) social fabric of the community, the way the farmers market puts together the people of the town and outlying areas," Slocum said.

Marcum, who farms in Liberty, Ind. about 12 miles northwest of Oxford, said she began selling produce such as vegetables, herbs and vegetable bedding plants in the OFMU in 2004 and said it's the great market that keeps her coming back.

"It's a real camaraderie there between the vendors," Marcum said. "You get to know your customers really well and customers will often request that you grow a vegetable that they like."

Meg Vostal, a part-time English instructor at Miami University, has been shopping at the OFMU for three years and also serves on the farmers market council. According to Vostal, the market connects the community to the farmers and the unique selection of products they bring.

"It's a way for the people in our community to connect to local growers," Vostal said. "I buy my lettuce from a farmer named Harv who farms in Riley Township and without the farmers market, I wouldn't have access to his product."

According to Slocum, the farmers market will not only be selling fresh fruits and vegetables, but baked goods, crafts and organic meat as well. There will be more than 27 types of tomatoes and 13 types of lettuce available from local farmers at the market, as well as new vendors selling jams, pottery and eggs, he said.

For many involved, it is the freshness and taste of goods sold at the farmers market that make it stand out from supermarket products that are grown to sustain packaging and stocking.

"Once you taste fruit or produce that is locally grown, it gets really hard to go back to buying things at the supermarket," Vostal said.

To participate in the farmers market, vendors must pay an annual $50 fee to register and an additional $5 each Saturday they sell their goods, averaging roughly a cost of $6.50 for vendors who participate each Saturday, Slocum said.

According to Slocum, the money collected from these fees goes toward advertising and maintaining the OFMU Web site with plans of purchasing a trailer to store needed equipment for the market.

Although all sale records are kept by the vendors, the success of the farmers market can be measured by attendance. According to Slocum, approximately 400 to 600 visitors attended the market each Saturday last year.

"We know that there are a lot of happy customers that go away every week and a lot of happy farmers that come back," Slocum said.