CLIMAX, NC – This autumn, Faylene Whitaker was celebrated as the 2024 Sunbelt Ag Expo Southeastern Farmer of the Year.

In 2025, Whitaker Farms & Garden Nursery will celebrate 50 years of operation. What began as 10 acres of tobacco has grown into a highly diversified operation on over 900 acres of owned and rented land in North Carolina’s central Piedmont. The farm produces organic tobacco, corn and wheat as well as 15 acres of strawberries, 35 acres of field tomatoes and a variety of vegetables and garden plants (including annuals, perennials, containers and more).

Today, Whitaker’s son Shane handles the field crops while Faylene oversees production of garden plants and flowers. Shane’s wife Kelly handles the farm’s significant agritourism component. You’ll regularly find the public at the farm on weekends throughout the year, enjoying whatever harvest is seasonal as well as perusing crafters set up in booths. There’s often a band playing in the gazebo by a large pond in the center of the home farm.

It all started as a storybook love story between Faylene and her husband Richard. The two met in elementary school, and even though they didn’t become a couple until later, in those early grade school years they both individually stated (to other people) that they saw themselves being married to each other when the time came.

In 1975, Faylene and Richard were newly wed and not long out of high school. Richard was working construction and Faylene was in business school. They both shared a dream to farm. So they started farming together, with an initial crop of 10 acres of tobacco.

“We loved it,” Faylene recalled. “We were working together. It was a common dream. There was no looking back.”

After the first tobacco harvest, the Whitakers bought a 36.5-acre parcel which today constitutes the home farm. “That was a lot of land back then,” Faylene said.

During the summer months Faylene and Richard worked side by side. In the winters, Richard would work off the farm, running a pine tree planting business he started.

In time, the forestry business grew (eventually employing 50 people), and the farm evolved to produce more than just tobacco. In the 1980s, the Whitakers experimented with tomatoes, selling at a farm stand. Then they grew strawberries. By the ‘90s, they were adding greenhouses to develop their produce and garden plant operations.

To learn how to raise the various crops, Faylene studied, carrying with her books which helped her develop an understanding of how to farm.

“They called me ‘the book lady,’ because I always had a book in my hand,” she remembered.

In addition to the knowledge they gleaned from books, the Whitakers also had the conviction which comes from faith in God and the use of prayer.

“I definitely believe in prayer,” Faylene said.

She explained that she orients her life by putting God first, then family, then employees, then the business. With those priorities, she said, “God has richly blessed us.”

The farm employs about 70 people, a mixture of full-time, part-time and H-2A workers.

“I am blessed with great employees,” Faylene said. “And I also couldn’t have better daughters-in-law.”

Richard and Faylene Whitaker (center), with their extended family. Photo courtesy of Whitaker Farms

Their younger son, Travis, did for some years work on the farm, but today runs his own businesses (a waterscape company and a custom apparel company) with the help of his wife, Shannon. Shane also runs an equipment business which repairs the farm’s equipment and provides trucking for the farm’s crops and takes on outside work.

Tomatoes during season have a high demand for transport. From mid-June through fall frost, the farm produces two to three tractor trailer loads of tomatoes per day.

While most of the tomato crop is wholesaled, some is retailed at the farm’s two garden centers and at the Piedmont Triad Farmers Market. The garden center at the home farm has for the past four years also featured a bakery.

“Food sales have gone up every year,” Faylene said. Customers can stop by for lunch Monday through Saturday.

The field crops have been organic for 14 years. The corn and wheat are sold to a local mill and direct to an organic chicken company.

The farm does not do U-pick, with the exception of some patches of strawberries and pumpkins which are reserved for school groups.

The only thing missing for Faylene when she was announced 2024 Southeast Farmer of the Year was the presence of Richard, who passed away in August 2023. But she knows he’s in a better place.

In the last years of his life, Richard fought a long battle with blood disease. “People would ask him ‘How do you stay positive?’” Faylene recalled. “And he would say ‘I know I’m going to be healed one way or another!’”

After a moment, Faylene continued, “You can live your dreams. There will be sacrifices. There will be a lot of hard work, but – if you’re willing to learn from others – you can get there.

“I love that the next generation will be here to continue the dream we started, to keep expanding the dream.”

by Karl H. Kazaks