Our Story

After careers in Geology (Ed) and Nursing/Healthcare Consulting (Karen) which took us across the United States and around the world, we settled on several acres in Ed's hometown of Marion, NC for this adventure in rural life.

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Having healthy food, grown without artificial chemicals or pesticides, is important for us to put on our table and share with customers. We don't treat our bees with any chemical treatments and when we started our market garden, we adopted the same practices. 

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We are often asked where we came up with the name for Sweet Betsy Farm and the simple story is that it is named after our very first chicken. Sweet Betsy was a Golden Comet and lived a long and fruitful life. Betsy was unique in that she loved to be picked up and petted, was always "talking" to everyone who went by and had a little "curl" in her comb. She commanded the coop in a gentle but firm way and reminded Ed of a favorite family member.

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In 2020, in response to the Covid virus crisis and potential food insecurity among our neighbors, we expanded our garden and started growing food, As you can imagine, pollination of our plants wasn't an issue! In the summer of 2020, we were able to donate over 700 pounds to local food banks and neighbors. 

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We looking forward to meeting you in person!

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Ed and Karen Speer