ConserveLand Blog

Written By Ambassador Marilyn Ware*

I’ve found that springtime is a good time to do my annual “Amos Funk inventory”.  I’ve done it secretly for years, ever since I met Amos about thirty years ago.  There is something special about seeing the farms and fields turn toward green, then move to a rich brown, upon tilling. The idea that farming, and the culture of the family farm would exist in perpetuity never would have succeeded had it not been for Amos and his sense of stewardship.

Not one to ever let life pass him by, Amos soared as an athlete in his early years. He set a state pole-vaulting record for instance. Little could he have guessed that he would, metaphorically, vault even higher in another arena later in life. That athletic event turned out to be symbolic of the kind of challenge that he seemed to like best.  And saving our soils and way of life vaulted him onto the state and national scene.  He was a true visionary; he became interested in soil conservation in the 1930s, long before others understood the long term consequences of ignoring this invaluable raw material. As a result, he went on to become a charter member of the Lancaster County Conservation District which he served on for more than 40 years. During the 1960s and 70s he advocated agricultural preservation to local audiences, but to no avail.

Generations will benefit from his tenacity. We were so fortunate to have had that oft- impatient, futuristic conservationist and dedicated steward among us. He was certainly not ambivalent. While Amos mellowed as the movement finally became all encompassing, he admitted to me that his zeal was occasionally excessive. With a smile, he recounted the times that his beloved wife Esta took hold of his jacket and gave it a tug while he was adamantly “selling” agricultural land conservation at meetings. That signal meant that it was time for him to sit down. And sit he did, but not without noting that he needed to contact the skeptics and opponents whom he had not quite convinced that night.

The work of preserving Lancaster County’s prime soils, the culture of farming and the county’s farm economy is a task that he relished.  He was a true visionary.  Although I can’t directly attribute each of the 1,098 now preserved farms to Amos’ vision, persistence and sometimes scrappy nature, he surely has been our primary mover and shaker over the years. And I think of him even more now that he is gone from us.  I know there were times that he thought we would never succeed.  Many of us shared those discouraging periods and turned to one another – most often to Amos – for encouragement. Today that seems a long time ago. But there is good news about our future here.   We now contribute to a momentum that has critical mass.  All townships now have agricultural security areas, and as part of a municipal outreach program, Lancaster Farmland Trust staff serves on agricultural advisory committees in Penn, West Lampeter, and Caernarvon Townships. Efforts continue to extend the reach of preservation by partnering with local municipalities to leverage preservation dollars and help ensure that agriculture remains viable in Lancaster County.

Now tens of thousands of us are dedicated to the same mission thanks to the activism and stewardship which Amos preached and embodied.  The current picture – 86,556 acres –  reflects the vision that Lancaster County farmers, citizens, realtors, builders, businesses, academics, philanthropists and government leaders at all levels have worked in unison to realize over the past twenty plus years.  When I see the beginning of the spring field work, I suspect that Amos is looking down on us thinking that we have succeeded… And, as a second thought, he might gently chide us to pick up the pace. We will.

Originally printed in Open Views, a publication of the Lancaster Farmland Trust. Reprinted with permission.

Editors Note: Amos Funk was awarded the Lifetime Conservation Leadership Award by the Pennsylvania Land Trust Association in 2010 (read more).