Aug 20, 2026 · 38 min · 10 segments
You may know Wendell Berry for his writing on what we stand to lose through industrial agriculture—and what it will take to defend farmers, preserve small farms and agrarian culture, and advocate for…
Michael Reid DimockHostHello, and welcome to the fifth of our six-part podcast series featuring voices from the 2026 Old Salt Festival in the Blackfoot Valley of Montana.
The Old Salt Festival tagline, Land is Kin, reflects the philosophy of the great poet, essayist, and novelist Wendell Berry.
Today, Michael speaks with Mary Berry, his daughter, and the executive director of the Berry Center in Newcastle, Kentucky.
Mary and the Berry Center are dedicated to sharing and demonstrating the critical importance of agrarian culture, small farms, and community through a variety of activities which Mary and Michael explore.
Enjoy the show.
Mary Berry is a gem in the crown of the community of people across the nation dedicated to fixing our food system.
I can imagine that being the daughter of one of America's greatest writers could be a burden that might cause one to shrink from the public eye or become somehow inflated by the reflected light.
She is grounded, humble, yet passionate and determined to articulate and demonstrate the essence of her family's defense of agrarian values, small farms, and rural communities.
Mary is a writer in her own right and an eighth-generation farmer with her husband, Steve Smith, who started the first CSA in the entire state of Kentucky.
The Berry Center, which she has led since its founding in 2011, is dedicated to not only the work of her father, but also her uncle, who was a state senator, and her grandfather, who was a leader of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative.
They all work to preserve small farm agriculture, and the Berry Center is a keeper of the flame.
Located in the rural town of New Castle, Kentucky, Mary travels all over the country sharing the good word.
And she's been to Sonoma County several times over the years and was recently at UC Berkeley in conversation with Michael Pollan and others to discuss the 50th anniversary of her father's seminal book, The Unsettling of America, Culture and Agriculture.
I read the book, again, cover to cover, and this was the first time I read it cover to cover.
It's a great warning of what is robbed from this nation as we allow industrial thinking and industrial agriculture to devastate our rural communities.
Her impressive team maintains an archive of papers from her family's work, a bookstore, reading circles focusing on agrarian themes, a direct marketing project for local beef producers, and a demonstration farm that teaches sustainable timber and pasture practices, as well as uses of hand tools.
They also host cultural events, and I thoroughly enjoyed one during my brief visit last April.
I would love more people to know about the Berry Center and its good work.
As you will hear from our Old Salt conversation today, Mary is resolute in her defense of small farms, yet empathic and wise.
Read the full transcript.
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Hello, and welcome to the fifth of our six-part podcast series featuring voices from the 2026 Old Salt Festival in the Blackfoot Valley of Montana.
The Old Salt Festival tagline, Land is Kin, reflects the philosophy of the great poet, essayist, and novelist Wendell Berry.
Today, Michael speaks with Mary Berry, his daughter, and the executive director of the Berry Center in Newcastle, Kentucky.
Mary and the Berry Center are dedicated to sharing and demonstrating the critical importance of agrarian culture, small farms, and community through a variety of activities which Mary and Michael explore.
Enjoy the show.
Mary Berry is a gem in the crown of the community of people across the nation dedicated to fixing our food system.
I can imagine that being the daughter of one of America's greatest writers could be a burden that might cause one to shrink from the public eye or become somehow inflated by the reflected light.
She is grounded, humble, yet passionate and determined to articulate and demonstrate the essence of her family's defense of agrarian values, small farms, and rural communities.
Mary is a writer in her own right and an eighth-generation farmer with her husband, Steve Smith, who started the first CSA in the entire state of Kentucky.
The Berry Center, which she has led since its founding in 2011, is dedicated to not only the work of her father, but also her uncle, who was a state senator, and her grandfather, who was a leader of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative.
They all work to preserve small farm agriculture, and the Berry Center is a keeper of the flame.
Located in the rural town of New Castle, Kentucky, Mary travels all over the country sharing the good word.
And she's been to Sonoma County several times over the years and was recently at UC Berkeley in conversation with Michael Pollan and others to discuss the 50th anniversary of her father's seminal book, The Unsettling of America, Culture and Agriculture.
I read the book, again, cover to cover, and this was the first time I read it cover to cover.
It's a great warning of what is robbed from this nation as we allow industrial thinking and industrial agriculture to devastate our rural communities.
Her impressive team maintains an archive of papers from her family's work, a bookstore, reading circles focusing on agrarian themes, a direct marketing project for local beef producers, and a demonstration farm that teaches sustainable timber and pasture practices, as well as uses of hand tools.
They also host cultural events, and I thoroughly enjoyed one during my brief visit last April.
I would love more people to know about the Berry Center and its good work.
As you will hear from our Old Salt conversation today, Mary is resolute in her defense of small farms, yet empathic and wise.
