BY HATTIE FRANCIS/CONTRIBUTING WRITER
hattiefrancis@gmail.com

COURTLAND—Capron farmer M.L. Everett Jr., who serves on the board for Virginia Farm Bureau, last week read to Connie Burgess’s pre-kindergarten class at Riverdale Elementary.

On Friday, Everett’s sister, Renita Snyder, read to classes at Southampton Academy.

“I’m at Southampton Academy today on behalf of the Southampton County Farm Bureau Women’s Committee helping Ag in the Classroom to promote agriculture during the Agriculture Literacy Week,” Snyder said.

Members of the Southampton County Farm Bureau Women’s Committee read “Ready, Set, Grow! A Tour of Virginia Farms and Agriculture” to children. The book introduces Farm Bureau mascot, Farmer Ben, and his dog, Sandy, as they tour Virginia farms.

“Our committee has read to Southampton Academy, Capron Elementary, Riverdale (Elementary),” Snyder said. “I just feel that it is important to educate our children about agriculture. There are so many children that take where their foods and their clothes come form for (granted).”

“They don’t even know where they come from,” she continued. “They think peanuts grow on trees instead of under the ground.”

Snyder and Everett were both raised on Everett Farms in Capron. Everett farms that same land today with his son, Lewis, and father, Marvin.

“He really enjoyed that,” Snyder said about Everett reading to students. “He said the kids were great. They asked a lot of questions. They actually had a child that thought the milk came from the grocery store, but he quickly told them it came from the farmer’s cow.”

The Southampton County Farm Bureau’s Women Committee also placed or will place book barns at the local schools. They have been placed in Nottoway, Riverdale and Southampton Academy.

“We have two others to go in Capron and S.P. Morton,” Snyder said.

The Southampton County Farm Bureau Women’s Committee donates the barn along with 25 agricultural-related books.