Meet the Family

It depends on who you ask when and where our story starts. For my older children it started when we sold produce and Amish barns and outdoor furniture in the late 90’s when we lived in Farmville, VA, or for most of them today they will tell you about the 10x20 tent at Sutter Egg Farm in Sarasota. Or some of them might say it started at Fruitville Grove Market where we learned so much about local Florida produce and our loyal Sarasota customer base was born. My youngest will say it was our Palmer store where we officially became Detwiler Farm Market that our story started.

But for me it started in Franconia, PA, as the grandson of a butcher Edgar Landis. Our Mennonite culture taught us to work with our parents and grandparents, so my brothers and I were taught the trade of butchering and retailing at Franconia Meats. Memories of cutting meat aside of my grandfather or helping him make scrapple our some of my favorite. Or helping my dad make sausage or grind hamburger or make deliveries to Landis Supermarket, our cousins who owned a “big” supermarket. As I got older the butcher shop and retailing became a big part of my life.

Growing up on a little 8 acre “farm” in Vernfield, PA taught me a few other things about life that serve me well today. Number three in a family of eight you learn to do your part and share, and I learned about simple and frugal eating and living. 

My dad loved farming better than butchering but to pay the bills needed a job so that’s how we ended up working for my grandfather. My grandfather, Arther Detwiler, was a farmer and I think he raised and butchered chickens to sell locally or to hucksters that pedaled them into Philadelphia. My favorite picture of him is an old black and white of him standing in the barn with a big smile on butchering day.  

I think it was my parents big garden that taught me how good “fresh” tastes. Also, how much hard work goes into a garden or farm to get good veggies or fruit, so I try to always respect the farmer. Remember the saying, “no farmer, no food”.

Some people ask about my passion for our bakery and I have to say it was my mom, memories of coming home from school and greeted with the sights and smells of her homemade bread hot out of the oven. She knew when to have it hot and fresh. It would not be good to tell you how many loaves of bread a couple of brothers and sisters can eat with margarine and honey or peanut butter and jelly. Was that really 45 years ago?  

She taught me how to knead the bread to make it softer and to add natural ingredients to make it stay fresh longer. I loved making cakes and she would teach me how cream the butters and sugars and not to over-mix or not to open the oven too often.

If I can boast a little, few people made a better homemade doughnut than my mom. Period. Her secret ingredient was love and of course her potatoes. I can hear her now telling me how important it is to get the lard hot enough, and to let them raise just right and how to slip them into the hot fat and flip them at just the right time. 

I remember the day I came home from my construction job because it was raining, and my wife Natalie and I made a batch of doughnuts, of course she already called my mom for her recipe and little tips. That was before google and all the other fun little ways we find recipes today.

This started something that we still like to do together as a family. Natalie is a great teacher and has taught our five daughters to bake and cook. My four sons married wives that cook and bake you should see our holiday table. Many of my best memories include food and family. 

My produce days take me back some forty plus years to route 113 and Franconia to a little farm stand that we called Windy Acres Farm Market. 

It's hard to tell you this part of my story, my older brother Arlin who passed away suddenly a couple years ago was a big part of my start in produce. He loved to farm and made planting, hoeing weeds and harvesting look easy and fun. It wasn’t fun or easy for me instead my back from from picking vegetables and my brother would usually have to help me finish weeding my row.  

As much as Arlin liked farming, I liked the market the buying and selling, the interaction with customers. Bringing them fresh produce. He would pick fresh sweetcorn for them every day. I would find homegrown cantaloupes, watermelons, vine ripe tomatoes, strawberries, peaches, apples, grapes and cherries mostly local and seasonal produce. Mom and my sisters would make fresh baked goodies like shoofly pies, sticky buns or apple pies and funny cakes. 

That was yesterday.

Today produce continues to be our #1 department and we continue to want to grow it into something even better for you our loyal customer. Remember “Eat fresh for less” isn’t a slogan. It’s the way we do business!

-Henry Detwiler, Sr.