Farming heritage celebrated at Quincy Farmer-Consumer Awareness Day
Mark Kallstrom of Kallstrom Sweet Corn, the FCAD Farm Family of the Year, waves to the crowd during the parade.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Dancers from Ballet Sol y Luna, Quincy, wore their most colorful dresses in the Quincy FCAD parade.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Students from all Quincy elementary schools, including Ancient Lakes, brought a contingent to march in the FCAD parade.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Rebekah Kaylor designs a block for a quilt to be raffled for the Quincy Special Olympics team. The volunteer project was new to FCAD 2024.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
The FCAD car show attracted a lot of cool cars, even more than the 2023 show, said Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce President Rebecca Ayala.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Customers check out the produce at the Quincy FFA Alumni sale.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Hope Tadema, Soap Lake, carefully evaluates the entries in the Quincy Farmer-Consumer Awareness Day quilt show. Organizer Many Ottley said it was the biggest FCAD quilt show ever.
Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
QUINCY — The contribution made by farmers – in Quincy, statewide, nationwide and worldwide – was recognized with an entire day of events at Farmer-Consumer Awareness Day in Quincy Sept. 14.
The fields and range around Quincy produce an abundance of crops, which the Quincy Rotary emphasizes in its fundraising FCAD barbecue lunch. Everything on the plate, from the beef to the fries to the apples, is produced in the fields around Quincy, said Rotary member Harriet Weber.
The Quincy FFA Alumni Association traditionally sponsors a produce sale in the Quincy Middle School parking lot, and business was brisk.
“We sold out of so many things,” said one of the volunteers overseeing the cash register.
The alumni association was selling onions, potatoes, Gala and Honeycrisp apples, shallots, tomatoes, watermelon, lavender bouquets and honey, said association president Calvin Bushman.
“And one of best sellers, beans,” he said.
The corn was donated by Kallstrom Sweet Corn, the FCAD 2024 Farming Family of the Year.
“All of this is grown locally and the farmers donate it,” Bushman said. “Every year it gets a little bit bigger, we get a few more products.”
The money raised goes to support the Quincy High School Future Farmers of America chapter, and FFA members were running the cash register and helping customers. By midafternoon the corn was sold out, the bins of apples and onions were almost empty and there was one lonely watermelon left.
“We’ve done really well,” Bushman said.
The FCAD parade featured – well, there was pretty much everything, from massive tractors to cool cars to dancing horses to students from Quincy’s four elementary schools. The Quincy High School band gave an impromptu concert as they practiced prior to the parade.
The parade route winds through downtown Quincy – that guy driving the truck with the excavator deftly managed a tricky turn around a corner on Central Avenue North – and ends at QMS, which hosts most of the activities. The QMS gym was filled with vendors, there was a car show on the playfield out back, the dancing horses were performing across the street.
The annual quilt show is part of the tradition, and organizer Mandy Ottley said quilt artists submitted 92 entries.
“This is our biggest quilt show ever,” she said.
For 2024 the quilt show featured something new, bins of precut fabric that people could use to design their own quilt block. Volunteers sewed the blocks together; volunteer June Jasman said the finished blocks will be combined into a quilt and raffled to support the new Special Olympics team in Quincy.
“This is our little bit of help for them,” Jasman said.
It was pretty easy to get volunteers, she said.
“We just asked them, ‘Can you come help?’ And they showed up,” she said.
People who designed the quilt blocks were invited to sign them. Rebekah Kaylor, Quincy said she was happy to help.
“I love quilts and I love the idea they’re doing this to support the Special Olympics,” she said.
Dancers from Ballet Sol y Luna, Quincy, wore their most colorful dresses in the Quincy FCAD parade.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Students from all Quincy elementary schools, including Ancient Lakes, brought a contingent to march in the FCAD parade.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Rebekah Kaylor designs a block for a quilt to be raffled for the Quincy Special Olympics team. The volunteer project was new to FCAD 2024.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
The FCAD car show attracted a lot of cool cars, even more than the 2023 show, said Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce President Rebecca Ayala.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Customers check out the produce at the Quincy FFA Alumni sale.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal
Hope Tadema, Soap Lake, carefully evaluates the entries in the Quincy Farmer-Consumer Awareness Day quilt show. Organizer Many Ottley said it was the biggest FCAD quilt show ever.Cheryl Schweizer/Basin Business Journal