Clinging Fast to the Land

Until 1970, LG Frix, now 49, acted out a familiar Southern story: leaving the land. The son of a sharecropper LG (his actual name) quit school in the fifth grade because he along with his six brothers and three sisters, "had to work at home too much" on the farm just outside Atlanta. Eight years later, at 19, he struck out on his own, working first at a factory job, then in a chicken plant, then jobbing vegetables. But all the time, he says, "I still had that farming in my mind. It was like somethin' was botherin' me."

So six years ago, Frix used his $5,000 savings account to make a down payment on 300 acres in Talbotton Ga. about 90 miles south of Atlanta, planted his mobile home on the ocher earth and moved in with his wife Judy, then 23 and one small daughter. Since then, he has become an exemplar of another type of Southerner: the small farmer who clings to the land even though he can barely scratch a living out of it Frix' s farm today has shrunk to about 100 acres ("We didn't have a choice; it was sell part or lose it all"); his family has grown to include a three-month-old son and four daughters aged two to nine. He and his wife look ten years older than their calendar ages. "It wears on you," Judy murmurs.

The Frixes have planted 25 acres with 1,000 peach trees. LG and Judy pick most of the fruit themselves. "We ain't made but one real crop, though," says Frix. "Cold weather killed them." Another 20 acres have been planted to snap beans, butter beans, cucumbers and squash, but there have been problems with those crops too. "Like a month ago I planted two acres of snap beans," he says. "They came up good. Then I go over there and found just one bean standing up. Deer was eatin' them up." The remaining 53 acres are wooded, and LG cannot afford to clear them for cultivation

The Frixes sell nearly all their produce at a giant red white and blue roadside farm stand that Frix built himself. But when few customers visit the stand, Frix piles the produce into his pickup truck and drives north to Atlanta's Farmers Market, sometimes sleeping in the truck for several nights until all the peaches and vegetables are sold. Last year his total sales came to $16,100, out of which he netted a mere $3,720. Outlays for sprays, seed and fertilizer ate up $10,000 his two aging tractors cost another $ 1,000 or so to run.

Judy economizes wherever she can. The family's grocery bill averages a mere $25 a month. "We never buy meat," she explains. "LG hunts deer, squirrels and wild rabbits I make everything I can: butter, buttermilk, cream, preserves catsup and applesauce. We have all the fresh vegetables we want "

Last June the paltry returns brought Frix to the point of leaving the land a second time. He advertised his farm for sale for $75,000, found a buyer and shook hands on a deal That very day, however, Judy was rushed to the hospital to give birth to their first son, Joshua. So, says Frix "I called the man up and told him the deal was off. I told him we had a son and I wanted to see if Joshua wanted the farm "

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