One Farm | One Family

Since 1979, the Jennings Family Farm has been working hard to grow healthy and nutritious foods for all. The story of the farm starts with Archie and Mattie Jennings. Archie grew up in coal country West Virginia, the oldest of three boys who lost their father at an early age in a tragic accident. At age 10, his first job was cleaning coal for his uncle at a nearby mine. Early on the Archman knew he had a passion for growing things – living things. Just out of high school, he grew his first two acre corn crop that he harvested by hand – from there the dream truly started. Mattie was born into a Swartzentruber Amish (sorry, no pictures) family in southern Ohio, the eighth born of 13 children. Always up for the physical demands of hard labor and challenging the traditional views, Mattie found herself often working alongside her brothers doing the ‘men’s work’ out in the fields, but was also a keen student in school (though in her world at the time that meant only school through the 8th grade). Also losing a parent at a young age – her mother to cancer in her early teens, the Amish Warlord (her children would later lovingly call her) wanted more opportunities than the ultra conservative old-order would allow and left the Amish at 15. Eventually, mom and dad would move to Michigan nearly 40 years ago and establish what is now the Jennings Family Farm.

Over 40 years and four children later, the Jennings Family Farm has pushed through the humble beginnings of 1979 with a moving trailer housing about 40 hogs to the modern day with nearly 450 diversified, certified organic acres that cultivate cereal grains, beans, beef, honey, and more. Today, three generations work together for the environment, for the land and animals, and for the modern consumer. For four decades, one family and one farm have worked together through many hardships and opportunities, including: the skyrocketing interest rates on farm mortgages that accompanied the ‘Farm Crisis’ of the 1980s – changing rural America forever; the rise of farm consolidations and big meat processing plants coupled with extreme weather events of the 1990s that further pushed family farms out of business; the US government’s creation of the National Organic Program in 2000 and the Jennings Family Farm organic certification in 2005 that initiated a turn in the farm’s previously bleak bottom-line; and now the last decade of joys, trials, and tribulations of learning how to grow crops, livestock, and other wholesome products organically with perspective shifts toward cultivating healthy soils and nutrient dense products. 

Here we are today, Virginia (Archie & Mattie’s third daughter) and her partner Ben, integrating the modern technology of e-commerce and our country’s incredible ability to market, ship, and deliver to the concerned consumer. Firefly Fields Incorporated is the online farm store connecting you directly to the Jennings Family Farm providing you a ‘Taste of Place.’ The teamwork, persistence, and ethic of our parents and our family to survive, maintain, and thrive on the land as a family farm operation over the years is the pure delight we promise you’ll taste in every product that was hand-bottled, hand-fed, hand-weeded, and hand-delivered to your front door. 

Our values are simple: One Source: One Family & One Farm | Nutrient Density: Wholesome Soil = Wholesome Food | Pure Delight: Our Joy = Your Joy.

Enjoy the RAW flavor of something good for you, good for the community, and good for the environment! DELIGHT!