Torrey Farms is a large

family farm A family farm is generally understood to be a farm owned and/or operated by a family; it is sometimes considered to be an Estate (land), estate passed down by inheritance. Although a recurring conceptual model, conceptual and archetype, archet ...

located in

Elba, New York Elba is a town in Genesee County, New York, United States. The population was 2,370 at the 2010 census. The town is at the northern border of the county and is north of the city of Batavia. The town contains the village of Elba, located near the ...

, with a satellite property located in

Potter, New York Potter is a town in Yates County, New York, United States. The Town of Potter is located in the northwest part of the county and is south of Canandaigua. The population was 1,865 at the 2010 census. History Stafford C. Cleveland's ''Histo ...

. It is one of the largest vegetable-crop farm operations in New York. Together its two lots total some 10,000

acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imp ...

s, composed primarily of muckland, in the instance drained swampland. The farm grows mainly specialty vegetable crops, such as

sweet corn Sweet corn (''Zea mays'' convar. ''saccharata'' var. ''rugosa''), also called sugar corn and pole corn, is a variety of maize grown for human consumption with a high sugar content. Sweet corn is the result of a naturally occurring recessive muta ...

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' L., from Latin ''cepa'' meaning "onion"), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus ''Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the onion ...

carrot The carrot ('' Daucus carota'' subsp. ''sativus'') is a root vegetable, typically orange in color, though purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist, all of which are domesticated forms of the wild carrot, ''Daucus carota'', nat ...

cabbage Cabbage, comprising several cultivars of ''Brassica oleracea'', is a leafy green, red (purple), or white (pale green) biennial plant grown as an annual vegetable crop for its dense-leaved heads. It is descended from the wild cabbage ( ''B.&nb ...

squash Squash may refer to: Sports * Squash (sport), the high-speed racquet sport also known as squash racquets * Squash (professional wrestling), an extremely one-sided match in professional wrestling * Squash tennis, a game similar to squash but pla ...

cucumber Cucumber (''Cucumis sativus'') is a widely-cultivated Vine#Horticultural climbing plants, creeping vine plant in the Cucurbitaceae family that bears usually cylindrical Fruit, fruits, which are used as culinary vegetables.

s, and

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Unit ...

es, which is generally what is produced on muckland. The main farm in Elba comprises about 8,000 and spans parts of Orleans, Niagara and

Genesee Genesee, derived from the Seneca word for "pleasant valley", may refer to: Geographic features Canada *Genesee, Alberta, an unincorporated community United States *Genesee, California *Genesee, Colorado *Genesee County, Michigan *Genesee Co ...

counties. The property in Potter, New York, makes up the majority of a valley of muckland that stretches all the way from Potter to

Gorham, New York Gorham is a town in Ontario County, New York, United States. The population was 4,130 at the 2020 census. The town is named after Nathaniel Gorham. The Town of Gorham is at the southern border of the county, southeast of Canandaigua. History ...

along Flint Creek. It was a swamp until it was drained in the 1950s. Not all of the valley is owned by the Torreys. The valley itself was close to being the 12th of the

Finger Lakes The Finger Lakes are a group of eleven long, narrow, roughly north–south lakes located south of Lake Ontario in an area called the ''Finger Lakes region'' in New York, in the United States. This region straddles the northern and transitional ...

. The muckland in Elba is thought to be the largest continuous section of muckland in the world.

History

In 1626, the Torrey family left England due to disagreement with the church. The family first settled in

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...

, but later moved West in search of better soil. In 1803, John Torrey arrived in

Bethany, New York Bethany is a town in Genesee County, New York, United States. The population was 1,765 at the 2010 census. The town lies on the southern border of Genesee County. US Route 20 and NYS Route 63 pass through the town. History The area was first ...

. In 1948 Elbert Torrey purchased the Higley Farm in Elba. Today, the Torrey family farms over .

Labor

The farm makes use of

migrant workers A migrant worker is a person who migrates within a home country or outside it to pursue work. Migrant workers usually do not have the intention to stay permanently in the country or region in which they work. Migrant workers who work outsi ...

. In October 1997, 25 illegal migrant workers from Torrey Farms were arrested and set to be

deported Deportation is the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. The term ''expulsion'' is often used as a synonym for deportation, though expulsion is more often used in the context of international law, while deportation ...

Immigration Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle as permanent residents or naturalized citizens. Commuters, tourists, and ...

. This was one of the largest immigration raids in New York history and, along with other raids of the time, it caused a significant local labor shortage. Mareen Torrey, owner of Torrey Farms said, "I’m probably going to end up leaving $2 million worth of crop in the field and it’s adding up every day"

Rocket launches

In July 2009, the

Tripoli Rocketry Association The Tripoli Rocketry Association (TRA) is an international organization and one of the two major organizing bodies for high power rocketry in the United States. History Tripoli Rocketry Association was founded in 1964 in the Pittsburgh, Pennsy ...

held the 28th annual LDRS (Large, Dangerous Rocket Ships) rocket launch event at the Potter, New York portion of Torrey Farms; the 31st was held in July 2021; and the 34th in June 2015.LDRS34 Site

References

External links

Official websiteFacebook Page
{{Coord, 43, 5, 0.9, N, 78, 12, 4.5, W, display=title Farms in New York (state) Genesee County, New York 1948 establishments in New York (state)