Couple’s produce business grew gradually, continues to flourish

By Tammy Real-McKeighan

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    FREMONT, Nebraska (Fremont Tribune) — In the late 1970s, Gordon and Susan Miller’s children wanted to earn some spending money.

So the Millers planted sweet corn to provide their kids, Scott, Ryan and Kori, with jobs.

From that idea grew a produce business, called Grandview Farm.

The farm, south of Fremont, provides the Millers with a scenic view of beautiful sunrises. Wild turkeys can be seen in nearby fields and Canada geese fly over the Millers’ house.

A family whose roots go deep into the art and practice of farming, the Millers now enjoy seeing their grandchildren work on the farm.

The Millers mainly grow corn and soybeans but have also dedicated about 12 acres of their land to growing produce, which they sell at area farmers’ markets.

They grow a variety of produce including: asparagus, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, peppers, sweet potatoes, beets, broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, cabbage, kohlrabi, Brussel sprouts, squash, watermelon and cantaloupe.

The Millers’ fruit-and-vegetable venture grew gradually.

After they planted sweet corn, customers began asking for other types of produce.

“As our customer base increased, we raised more and different kinds of vegetables,” he said.

Susan began taking the produce to the Haymarket in Lincoln and farmers’ markets in Fremont. She now also takes produce to the Sunday Farmers’ Market at College View in Lincoln.

Miller retired from Hormel Foods Corporation in 2010 and began taking produce to farmers’ markets in Omaha. He takes vegetables to Village Pointe on Saturday and the Askarben Village Market on Sunday.

“We raise most of the vegetables for the farmers’ markets and we do some wholesale,” he said.

Miller enjoys growing produce.

“We’re able to get up in the morning and just go out and work. We have a more flexible schedule than someone who has to go to work somewhere,” he said.

Miller likes the challenges of growing vegetables.

“Every year is different,” he said. “You’re confronted with the changes of the weather, but it’s interesting.”

Like her husband, Susan enjoys the benefits of an outside workplace.

“I like working outdoors,” she said. “It’s peaceful. It’s calm. It’s real therapeutic some days. We’re out in nature.”

And they see plenty of nature.

They tell the story of a wild turkey.

The turkeys who come to the Millers’ cornfield, leave and fly toward Camp Cedars in the winter.

One tom turkey, probably injured in a fowl fight, had been rejected by the other birds.

He started hanging out not far from the Millers’ house. They set out some water and food for the turkey and he slowly recuperated.

The turkey would follow Miller down a lane as the man started to leave to go to town.

“He’d perch on a tree branch and wait and when I came home, then he’d jump off that branch and follow me right up to the house,” Miller said.

The late behaviorist B.F. Skinner, whose experiments involved chickens pecking a button to get a kernel of corn, probably would have enjoyed the turkey, who’d ring the Millers’ doorbell.

“He was smart,” Susan said of the turkey, who’d also try to nudge her bird feeder to knock seed out on the ground to eat.

When the hen turkeys returned from their winter grounds to the farm, he rejoined them.

The Millers still see the turkey once in a while.

They enjoy other aspects of their outdoor work.

“The sunrises are amazing,” he said.

In the morning, the skies are painted in shades of red, orange, yellow and pink.

“When we have a rain, you can see a rainbow and it will be cool, because you can see the whole thing,” she said. “Sometimes in town, you can only see a piece of it.”

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