I love telling stories about passionate people doing work that’s important and sustaining. Like Warren and Victoria Taylor, owners of Snowville Creamery in Southwest Ohio. The Taylors bring fresh, wholesome dairy products to customers throughout Ohio, parts of Indiana and Kentucky. Says Warren: “I decided that somebody had to stand up and bring quality milk to customers. I’m trying to bring good milk back to America and to re-establish the relationship between the dairy farmer and the customer.”
See what I mean? Passion.
I had the wonderful opportunity to tell the Snowville Creamery story in Edible Ohio Valley magazine, in collaboration with publisher and photographer Julie Kramer. We spent nearly two days at Snowville among the cows, listening and learning about the Taylors’ mission. Here’s an excerpt from the story:
At 4 p.m. on the dot, 135 cows plod in single file toward the milking parlor at The Brick, Bill Dix and Stacy Hall’s 300-acre farm in Southeast Ohio’s Meigs County. The animals queue up five abreast in a holding pen that resembles a large picnic shelter. They wait patiently, snuffling softly, their big, long-lashed eyes registering nothing but calm.
A floppy-hatted farmhand, petite and tough as nails, guides the cows into the parlor, affixes the vacuum milking equipment, and speaks gently to them as they milk and munch the handful of grain they regard as a treat. Ten minutes later, they’re moving back down the fenced lane toward an open paddock. This scene will repeat at sunup tomorrow, twice a day, 365 days a year. This is the rhythm of a dairy farm.
Read the full article in the Summer 2011 issue of Edible Ohio Valley.
