The Herald-News - News Story

Berries rooted in tradition: County's crops diversify, but strawberry legacy cemented in festival

Strawberries were so plentiful in Rhea County during the early 1900s that railcars full of the sweet fruit were dispatched across the country. It's no wonder that Rhea County earned the distinction of being "the strawberry capital of the world."

But the berry boom died, crippled by wartime labor shortages and soilborne diseases that sapped the earth of its strawberry-growing gusto.

Ironically, it was about 1947 when area farmers started searching out new cash crops. That was the year that a tiny, one-day strawberry festival sponsored by the Dayton Lions Club started.

The festival experienced peaks and valleys, but today it has blossomed into a 10-day long extravaganza that has cemented Rhea County's legacy as a strawberry hotbed - even though the berry is still far from the county's top crop.

While downtown Dayton explodes into vibrant Strawberry Festival spirit this week for the 62nd annual event, the county's only large-scale strawberry farm will be in full swing harvesting bundles of fruit for the crowds to enjoy.

The last berry farm
Ray Tidwell started his tiny farm near Spring City in 1983. He started as a row cropper, planting soybean and corn like he had done in his native Florida.

The farm flopped. The Tennessee soil wasn't producing the profit Tidwell hoped for.

That's when a local agriculture extension agent suggested he give strawberries a shot. Only three acres of berries were growing in Rhea County at the time, Tidwell recalls.

"I thought he was crazy," Tidwell says now.

The berry gamble paid off, though.

Today, Tidwell harvests 16 acres of strawberries. Each acre yields about 20,000 pounds of strawberries - easily making Tidwell the strawberry king in the "strawberry capital of the world."

"We probably would have went belly-up if we hadn't gone to strawberries," Tidwell said.

Tidwell's berries aren't packed onto railcars and shipped across the country. Instead, Tidwell has turned his name into a popular brand of berries cherished by regional produce buyers.

About 80 percent of his produce is sold from a shed on U.S. Highway 27. A "flat" of strawberries - about eight quarts - sells for $18.50, and throngs of strawberry-seekers line-up to buy the locally grown berries.

Other local markets, like Paul's Produce in Dayton, carry the popular Tidwell berries.

"It's always good if you can keep your product in your own hands," Tidwell said.

Keeping Rhea County's strawberry tradition alive is no easy feat for Tidwell.

The berry is a challenging crop to grow, and faces yearly challenges with spring freezes and summer droughts.

Every two weeks, Tidwell collects samples from his strawberry patches and sends them to North Carolina State University for testing. His fields are intricately irrigated for water and fertilizer.

Picking the berries is labor-intensive, too. Tidwell relies largely on migrant workers from Mexico through an agriculture visa program.

"Not many people want to be bent over picking strawberries all day," his wife, Emily Tidwell, said.

Tidwell estimates it costs $10,000 to $12,000 to grow a single acre of strawberry. Tidwell said he still turns a profit on the strawberries, much more so than the blueberries and peaches he grows on his sprawling farm.

But the rewards of being a berry farm can be as sweet as the fruit, if done properly.

"Strawberry is one of the highest value crops you can grow. There is a large demand," said Jerry Lamb, the agriculture extension director in Rhea County. "But it also costs a lot to raise an acre. It's a temperamental crop, too."

Lamb said many people outside the area think Rhea County is still booming with berries - largely because of the association with the Tennessee Strawberry Festival.

A poster near the entrance of the agricultural extension office does boast about Tennessee berries, referring to them as "irresistible" and "the freshest and sweetest berries you can buy."

But it's beef cattle that are the agricultural heavyweight in Rhea County, with about 250 producers located in the county, Lamb said. That largely overshadows the county's single strawberry farm.

Other types of agriculture have dwindled, according to Lamb. He said the number of dairy farms have dropped from a half-dozen to a single milk-producer in the last decade.

Only one area farmer grows tobacco now.

Farmers are searching for new crops, like switchgrass - a plant that is being used in ethanol and alternative fuel research. Two area farms are producing switchgrass for a University of Tennessee ethanol testing facility being built in Monroe County.

The housing boom of the last decade chewed up most farms, and the economic and labor demands of farming have made agriculture less appealing to young people, Lamb said.

"We've had nice, big farms cut up for houses. It's hard to find land without a house on it now," Lamb said. "[Farming] has such an upfront cost with equipment and all - it's a killer."

Farmers have diversified and shrunk their operations, as a result.

"Farms have gotten smaller as people try to find a niche," Lamb said.

Strawberries are a niche that will likely always be associated with Rhea County. The berry may not ever produce four million quarts a year, as it did during its peak a century ago, but the Tennessee Strawberry Festival seems to be a staple for drawing in folks hungry for the sweet berry.

"It's the heritage of the fact that strawberries played such a huge part in Dayton's economy, " said Randy Wells, coordinator of the Strawberry Festival.

"The festival is important because it's something everyone enjoys, and needless to say, it provides a huge boost to the local economy," he added. "Plus it's great that we have people driving from all over to get our strawberries."