WESTMINSTER-Third-generation Westminster farmer Paul Harlow was recently recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award and inducted into the Vermont Agricultural Hall of Fame.
He joins more than 100 inductees who have been honored over the past 20 years by the award, administered by the Champlain Valley Expo in Essex Junction.
“I think this is a culmination,” Harlow, 75, said of the honor. “It’s acknowledging the work of the last 60 years.”
Harlow Farm on Route 5 goes back 109 years to when his grandfather, Paul G. Harlow, bought the farm in 1917. His grandfather had grown up in Massachusetts and graduated from what was then Massachusetts Agricultural College (later the Stockbridge School of Agriculture at the University of Massachusetts).
Over the years, while visiting his Harlow cousins in Westminster — a branch of the Harlow family has lived there since the mid-1700s — the elder Paul Harlow became well aware of the rich agricultural soils of the Connecticut River Valley. That’s where he decided to buy a farm.
At that time, the original 180-acre farm offered vegetables and milk from a few cows sold at one of the first roadside farm stands in the 1940s, near the site of the present Harlow Farmstand and Café Loco building.
Paul Harlow’s father, Hollis “Hocker” Harlow, and his uncle, Roger Harlow, took over the farm after World War II and turned it into a full-scale dairy farm.
“My father switched to a dairy herd, and we grew some corn and asparagus,” Harlow said, and that was the farm he grew up working on next to his parents and siblings. Roger would move his family to Florida, while Hocker and his family, a wife and four kids, stayed in Westminster running the farm.
“My father sold the cows in 1965,” Harlow said, just a few years before Paul graduated from Bellows Falls High School in 1968.
With the dairy herd gone, the farm grew hay, asparagus, and sweet corn, which they sold to grocery stores in the Connecticut Valley region.
Harlow said that as a student — first in high school and then at Castleton State College, which he attended for three years — he really had no idea what he wanted to do with his life.
“Then I decided: ‘I think I want to be a farmer,’” he said. “I loved working outside. I really enjoy what I do.”
With that decision made, he switched to the Stockbridge School of Agriculture, his grandfather’s alma mater, for his last two years of college.
“In 1974 I told my dad I was taking over the farm,” Harlow said. “He was OK with that, as he was pretty burned out by then.”
Harlow formally took ownership of the farm in 1977, and, with he and his then-wife Susan Edgar in tune with the whole back-to-the-land and responsible farming movements of the time, he began the process of converting to organic farming, starting with a quarter acre plot.
“We read a lot, we experimented a lot, and I learned a lot from other Vermont organic farmers like Howie Prussack and Bob Gray,” he said.
Prussack created one of the earliest certified organic farms in Vermont and remains an iconic figure in organic farming, still operating High Meadows Farm in Westminster West. Gray, along with his wife Kim, operated the 4 Corners Farm in South Newbury for over 40 years.
Harlow said both deserve to also be in the Vermont Agricultural Hall of Fame.
In those first years, “each year we’d add another organic crop,” Harlow said, and year by year the organic farming practices enriched more of the farm’s soil. “We added squash, then pumpkins. Within 10 years, by 1983, we were fully organic, and the farm was certified organic in 1985.”
They also created a roadside food stand and helped start Deep Root Organic Truck Farmers, the first organic cooperative in New England.
“We added more farms, and eventually we were farming 375 acres on three farms, with 250 acres in vegetables,” Harlow said, noting that in 2005 he bought his brother Tom Harlow’s farm and in 2013, bought Riverview Farm in Putney.
“We’re probably one of the largest organic farms in the Northeast,” Harlow said.
He has also recently bought out the Harlow Farmstand, located essentially in the middle of the Westminster Farm on Route 5, from his brother Dan Harlow.
Environmentally progressive
Harlow’s environmental concerns also led him to set up a large solar panel installation on the farm in 2010, which was completely paid off by 2020.
In 2025, he installed more solar panels on the roofs of the farm’s barns and outbuildings, adding enough solar electric production to “supply almost 100%” of the farm’s electricity needs.
A lot of that energy has gone to power a new vacuum cooler, which allows for rapid cooling of multiple pallets of freshly harvested vegetables and leafy greens down to their cores, preserving freshness and extending shelf and shipping life. The process allows crops to be cooled to refrigeration levels in a matter of minutes.
Today, Harlow Farm organically grows and sells loose-leaf lettuces, kale, sweet corn, cabbage, winter squash, carrots, beets, pumpkins, rutabaga, turnips, radishes, watermelon, and purple daikon, all of which store well in the large cooler.
The system allows the farm to store 700 to 800 bins of produce through the winter. In addition, the farm has greenhouses where hardy cold-weather crops like some lettuces and kale can be grown throughout the winter.
“We’re able to grow and sell fresh greens year-round,” Harlow said.
The farm ships out two tractor trailer loads of organic produce every week, supplying local co-ops, food chains like Price Chopper and Whole Foods, and regional schools and hospitals via Food Connects, a nonprofit food hub connecting small farms to institutional customers.
Harlow Farm also offers organically fed and raised pork, free-range chickens, turkeys, and eggs.
Additionally, the farm has popular seasonal pick-your-own crops of strawberries and blueberries, and its greenhouses provide vegetable and herb seedlings for hundreds of local gardeners.
Community service and mentoring
In a press release, the Hall of Fame also described Harlow as “a dedicated innovator, educator, and community leader. He has mentored generations of young farmers, contributed to agricultural organizations such as NOFA [the Northeast Organic Farming Association], and shared his expertise at regional and national conferences on sustainable and efficient farming systems.”
The release noted that “his forward-thinking approach integrates vegetable production with livestock and soil regeneration, creating a closed-loop system that strengthens both productivity and environmental health.”
The award’s organizing committee also added that Harlow’s contributions have earned him numerous honors, including statewide recognition for his service and his work to improve environmental sustainability.
Above all, ”Harlow is known for his dedication to preserving the land,” the committee said, “strengthening local agriculture, and passing on a thriving farm legacy — earning him a reputation as a true leader and ‘farmer’s farmer’ in Vermont’s agricultural community.”
As early as the 1980s, Harlow was helping start a school garden when his kids were attending Westminster Center School.
“I could see the need to get good food in the schools,” Harlow said. “So, I found the time to volunteer a day each week with my kids at their school.”
Prussack agreed that Harlow’s commitment to his community deserves to be recognized.
“Paul is always ready to help our town in many ways, from helping start a garden for our central school and for serving for years as a selectman,” he said.
Prussack said Harlow is “always ready to help out other farmers with whatever is needed — equipment, advice, even land to give a new grower space to grow their dream.”
“I know of no other farmer that deserves this recognition than Paul and Harlow Farm,” he said. “Proud to call him a friend!”
Harlow Farm also donates a considerable amount of food each year to the Vermont Foodbank, and works with Willing Hands, a volunteer group that gleans unharvested produce from its fields twice a week.
“We give away 50,000 pounds of food each year,” Harlow said.
The future
Harlow says he still works “full-time, seven days a week, 10 hours a day” and is “not planning on retiring soon,” though, with produce farming being mainly seasonal work, he says he’s able to spend a few months away every winter in Key West, Florida, with his daughters.
In addition to approximately 10 local employees, Harlow brings in 18 Jamaican workers and two Brazilian workers each summer, some of whom have been working on the farm since 2000.
He does so under the federal H-2A program, which allows U.S. farmers to bring foreign nationals into the country for temporary and seasonal work. Harlow said that for many years it has been impossible to hire enough local workers or high school students in the summer months to plant and harvest crops.
Harlow said these experienced foreign farmhands quite ably handle all the day-to-day farm work in the fields, refrigerators, and packing lines.
“These men are like family now,” Harlow said. “I went to Jamaica for one of their weddings!”
He said the seasonal migrant workers are vital to Vermont agriculture.
“We couldn’t do what we do without them,” Harlow said. “These workers are invaluable to the whole industry. They are away from their families for six months a year, but they are able to send a lot of money home. They are very well trained and really run the farm.”
Harlow said between the foreign workers and his son Evan handling sales, safety, and paperwork, he can focus on the farming operation.
“Someone has to be out in the barn at 6 a.m. with the crew to lay out the work for the day,” he said. “That’s still me.”
Tragedy affects future plans
Harlow noted that food safety had “made us more efficient.” The farm needed a more sanitary line to replace a wooden wash-and-pack line, where harvested crops are cleaned, sorted, cooled, and boxed for the market.
That challenge led them to a vendor in Poland and the fabrication of a new pack line — made from stainless steel, automated, improved, and built specifically for the farm’s needs and specifications.
“The improved efficiency of this machine is unbelievable,” Harlow said.
Harlow had been working with another local organic farmer, Cory Walker, 41, who had overseen the design and manufacture of the new pack line in Poland. Both farmers envisioned the younger Walker taking over more of the day-to-day Harlow Farm operations.
But Walker accidentally drowned in 2025, a tragic loss in many ways, Harlow said.
“Now, my hope is to keep the farm debt-free and in the family,” he said.
Harlow noted that climate change has had a major impact on Vermont farmers, including affecting what they can grow.
Several once-in-a-century floods have occurred in the past 15 years, with Tropical Storm Irene destroying half of the farm’s crops in 2011.
These are hard events to plan for, he said.
Harlow’s outlook on other farming trends on the horizon is not as grim.
He described the proposed Food Hub on the Island in nearby Bellows Falls as a “great idea,” as it would really support smaller farmers who don’t have his processing capacity [“After 15 years of planning, a BF food co-op eyes a major milestone,” News, July 29].
“Anything that we can do to support local agriculture is important,” Harlow said. “Westminster is still a big ag town. There may come a day when we have to grow a lot more of our own food locally.”
Hall of Fame inductees
Founded in 2002, the Vermont Agricultural Hall of Fame has recognized Vermonters for their contributions to the state’s agriculture and working landscape.
In receiving the Lifetime Achievement award, Harlow was recognized as having “made a significant contribution to the advancement, improvement, or development of Vermont agriculture over the course of their long (30-plus years) career.”
Individuals are also inducted in two other categories: The Emerging Leader category recognizes next-generation Vermont agricultural leaders under age 40, and the Ag Innovator category recognizes fresh and forward-thinking Vermonters of any age who are making a positive impact on state agriculture.
Other inductees this year are Courtney Banach, of Addison, Emerging Leader; Heather Darby, of Alburgh, Agricultural Innovator; Dr. Ann Hazelrigg, of Williston, Lifetime Achievement; and Doug Flack, of Enosburg, Lifetime Achievement.
The 2026 inductees will be formally recognized and celebrated during the Champlain Valley Fair in September.
This News item by Robert F. Smith was written for The Commons.