Ken Sparks, otherwise known as Farmer Ken, starts his day early in the morning to beat the sweltering Southern California heat. By 9 a.m., Sparks has surveyed most of his crops before the nape of his neck begins to glisten. He usually dons a wide-brim straw hat which hangs by the front door of his home that opens onto his garden. His home is fragrant with the essence of jasmine, lavender, mint and peach blossoms that occupy much of his front and backyard. Sparks uses sheer organza bags to protect his more volatile crops like his array of lettuces, zucchini, tomatoes and budding fruits from the heat and pests that are constantly surveying his plot of land. He rarely worries about his organic luffa gourds due to their tough exterior, which is a high selling point for those interested in buying the natural exfoliator from Sparks. While Sparks began his growing journey early on in his adolescence by helping his grandmother in her garden in his native Ohio, the school administrator started his life as Farmer Ken after moving to Los Angeles and using the sparse space available to him at his inner-city home. Farmer Ken is not just Sparks’ name, it’s his calling card. Sparks became known as one of L.A.’s most notable urban farmers in 2020 during #BlackOutTuesday in which Black businesses were elevated online. Within a few days, Sparks’ Instagram was flooded with messages with people asking him how to start a food forest and expressing their appreciation for the work that he does as a Black farmer.
Ken Sparks, also known as Farmer Ken, on his plot of land in Temecula, California.
Sparks is amongst the 430 Black growers in California and the less than 50,000 remaining Black farmers in the United States. This number serves as a stark decline from previous years, namely the boom of Black agriculturalism that piqued at 925,708 Black farmers in 1920 who worked on 41.4 million acres of land across America. The population of Black growers, which experienced a curt drop off in 1997, tend to just 4.7 million acres of land today; organizations such as the Black Food and Justice Alliance point to discrimination, predatory lending practices and blatant land theft is the main cause of this decline of Black growers and land ownership. Farmers like Sparks not only farm for personal enrichment but to slow the steady decline of Black farmers in the agricultural industry due to land loss.
As his business grew, so did his need for more land. Sparks was used to making the best of his surroundings; his first home in Watts was mostly concrete and dry, compacted dirt until he made it into a permeable garden. He applied for a grant through the USDA that awards farmers the land and tools they need to successfully contribute to the agricultural industry. While it took about a year, Sparks secured the grant and was able to purchase an even larger plot of land in Temecula, California.
Ken Sparks flips through his seed binder.
“I’m in USDA’s Zone Nine B so one of the warmer zones in the nation, and I can grow year round. I can grow anything from all kinds of citrus, to peaches and plums and nectarines, apples” Sparks said.” I can grow everything.”
This plot of land seemed to be far beyond what Sparks would have been able to come across in L.A., let alone in his native Ohio where, according to the USDA, only 193 farms are Black-owned out of the 77,805 farms that are owned statewide. Such is the case nationwide, in which there is $51 million dollars worth of lost Black land.
Learn how community cooperatives like the Prosperity Market are aiding Black farmers like Ken Sparks give back to their community.
Ken Sparks gets ready to plant his next batch of seeds in his garden.
“It’s unfortunate that a lot of land has been lost,” Sparks said.”I think it’s a great thing for people to get back to growing… that's why I help people grow food in a variety of spaces. It’s great to be able to feed your own family and the community.”
Sparks also stands apart from mainstream growers as he is one of the few independent Black farmers in the U.S. Sparks knows he is one of the fortunate few to be able to actualize his dreams as a farmer—and while the crowd is small, he knows he is steadily being joined by fellow Black people who are seeking to own land.
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Farmer Ken with his prized hen, Patti Labelle.
“We talk about family legacies being lost because people do not have the access to capital. It’s not just my family, it’s hundreds of thousands of families in the nation,” says William Barber III, an environmental attorney and Black land loss advocate in North Carolina.
Land ownership has been a long-held symbol of freedom and arduous struggle for the Black community. Through General William T. Sherman’s Special Field Order 15 of 1865, freedmen or formerly enslaved people were granted the opportunity to homestead and farm on plots of land previously owned and abandoned by Confederate soldiers. This would become known as the “40 acres and a mule” policy and one that never ultimately came to fruition. Less than a year after Sherman’s order, Black land, which was formerly abandoned Confederate land, was seized by President Andrew Johnson who restored ownership to its original residents. Though government-sanctioned land delegation never materialized in the post-Civil War era, Black homesteaders and farmers still sought out land ownership. Black farmers in America have faced an arduous struggle to own land and to operate independently. Black land ownership fluctuated throughout the 19th and 20th century due to hard economic and social barriers. Independent organizations and cooperatives aided Black growers by providing financial support and space to operate, namely in the 1960s, yet the pursuit of independent land ownership remains an ongoing fight.
Ken Sparks at the Prosperity Market in Los Angeles, California.
Sparks is an independent farmer yet he, along with many other Black agriculturalists, still benefit from support from modern cooperatives that bridge that gap between him and the community he cares deeply about. Sparks knows his role in the agricultural industry goes far beyond him being a farmer given the small crowd of Black farmers he stands among. A large part of Sparks identifying as a Black farmer pertains to the community he aims to serve. Serving the Black community, especially those with little to no access to organic crops that go beyond the standard fare in sparse grocery stores that are a common sight in food deserts that exist mainly in communities of color. The lack of organic, unique food access in BIPOC communities was a big motivator for Sparks to begin turning what was once a hobby, into a business.
Spark’s business grew when he began vendoring for the creators of the Prosperity Market, a roving farmers market and modern Black farming cooperative, Carmen Dianne and Kara Still, who were looking to expand their definition of what a Black farmer could look like given the low percentage of Black land ownership. Sparks fit the bill as an urban farmer and has seen a great increase of support online and in person at his booth at the Prosperity Market.
Dianne and Still are trying to change the face of farmer’s markets which are thought to be a chiefly white space. On their website, Dianne and Still describe their roving business as “Not Your Average Farmers Market,” a fair statement given the majority of their vendors are Black and include artisans who make soy-candles, whipped African body butters, Alkaline popsicles and, most prominently, those who grow fresh produce like Sparks. Dianne and Still conceptualized the Prosperity Market in the height of the social unrest of 2020.
“We saw the need. We witnessed the social unrest and the push to support Black-owned businesses and when we started to look deeper at the causes of everything…within that exploration we came to the conclusion that we need more essential Black-owned businesses” said Carmen Dianne.
While neither Dianne nor Still had experience in agriculture, they knew from witnessing the health and financial issues within the Black community that something needed to be done.
“Food is the most essential,” Still said.
Courtesy of Instagram: Kara Still (left) and Carmen Dianne (right)
According to a report by USC Dornsife Public Exchange, one in 10 people in L.A. are food insecure, and 48 percent of Black people experience food insecurity nationwide. During the pandemic, Dianne and Still witnessed the toll that COVID-19 took on the health of the Black community, which was one of the demographics hardest hit by the virus on a national scale. The Black community also historically suffers from food-access induced health issues such as hypertension, diabetes and heart disease. Dianne and Still envisioned their market as a chance to provide a social and economic platform for Black farmers and growers, giving them a direct throughline to the Black community in L.A., both of which are historically marginalized.
“We need to find ways to create sustainability to circulate the dollar and to keep it within our community,” Still said.
Dianne and Still have a vested interest in alleviating the modern ills of their community with their market and credit the deep history of Black agriculturalism and homesteading as the blueprint for community building. They aim to reinstill the sense of community by creating a circular economy that was not able to be actualized by the original farmers and homesteaders. While they do not have a plot of land to host their vendors, they hope that by providing a collective space, Black residents and growers can create a synchronous relationship that heals past wounds and works towards a healthier future.
“We started to look deeper at the causes of everything,” Dianne said.”That was a great path to self-discovery and to the history of Black farmers and food-insecurity and the systemic reasons for it.”
Vendoring for the Prosperity Market has been fruitful for Sparks as he sees an increase of support online and in person when he sells his produce. Given his success, he knows he needs to expand his current plot of land. While he does not currently have the funds to do so, he is working on fundraising in order to fill the demands of his growing business.
“The project we’re hoping to do is reclaim this site in the midst of industrial land grabs,” Barber III said. “It means a lot to the family to reclaim this parcel and keep it in the family and maintain that legacy.”
See how William Barber III is honoring the legacy of Piney Woods by giving it new life through community partnership.
In addition to his national environmental and Black land loss advocacy work, Barber III is working to create a homesteading co-op called the Vera Brown Farm Project, which is named after a family member to whom the plot of land was passed down, to restore the legacy of his family’s homestead in Piney Woods, N.C., by providing a space for local growers to operate. Barber III is the son of pastor and co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign, William Barber II. Much like his father, Barber III has dedicated his life to social justice causes while bringing a new perspective with his special focus on climate change and the link between environmental and social issues. On top of his law practice, Barber III works with The Climate Reality Project, is a part of several North Carolina-based environmental justice organizations and is the co-chair of the North Carolina Poor People’s Campaign Ecological Devastation committee. Most recently, Barber III founded The Rural Beacon Initiative, a startup that calls to the mission of advancing environmental equity and justice within his community by exploring what he calls the role of green finance as a vehicle to address social disparities.
“I’m feeling the urgency of this because even though we were able to get this particular familiar parcel, there were between four and six parcels elsewhere of a similar size that we weren’t able to get that we lost because we weren’t able to have the financing put in place beforehand and I think that speaks to the reality of the scale of how much Black land loss is happening not only in the state but nationwide.”
The 52-acre plot of land, originally owned by a distant family member, was acquired through Barber III’s The Rural Beacon Initiative LLC with the financial backing of other environmental organizations who believe in the project.
The original Vera Brown homestead that sits of Barber III's plot of land in Piney Woods, North Carolina.
The project has garnered support from those willing to morally and financially support Barber III’s efforts to prevent further Black land loss. George C. Jones Jr., is one of Barber III’s business partners and the CEO of the newly formed BIPOC-run cooperative Inheritage Farms that is focused on the “...advancement of regenerative farming and sustainability practices” in marginalized communities in North Carolina. Jones Jr. says that the Vera Brown Farm Project is a budding example of what can be achieved by preserving and reclaiming Black land on the national scale.
“ We want to promote not only fiscal and financial stewardship, we want to encourage these communities and families to see themselves as a collective as a cooperative, and start thinking about the economic agenda they can create in order to be sustainable in the community,” Jones Jr. said.
While Barber III is grateful to have acquired the land, he believes having to buy back his own family’s land recalls the historical issue of Black land loss.
“This is one step in the direction of trying to stop some of that and trying to be proactive in trying to create solutions,” Barber III said.
William Barber III speaks about the significance of his grandfather's book as he writes the next chapter of his family's story.
William Barber III is looking to honor his original namesake, William Barber I, who penned Disciple Assemblies of Eastern North Carolina, a book that chronicles his family history in Piney Woods but also tells the story of Black homesteaders in the community who worked together with the native and white populations in the area to create a tri-racial community worked together to maintain a self-sufficient way of life.
“The project we’re hoping to do is reclaim this site in the midst of industrial land grabs,” Barber III said. “It means a lot to the family to reclaim this parcel and keep it in the family and maintain that legacy.”
William Barber III meets with Beth Roach (right) and Fix Cain (left) on the Vera Brown Farm to discuss a potential partnership.
He is also mindful of others who are trying to reclaim their ancestral land and agricultural practices, chief among them being the local indigenous community. One of Barber III’s first prospective tenants are Indigenous seed growers, Beth Roach and Fix Cain, two native Piney Woods residents, activists and homesteaders who farm their plot of land for the Alliance of Native Seed Keepers. In addition to keeping the Vera Brown Farm Project a localized organization, Barber III recognizes the significance of Roach and Fix's potential involvement in the project due to the persisting issue of Indigenous land loss.
“We’re hoping to identify ways we could partner with them. Really combining the best of original agriculture and also Indigenous practices in creative ways,” Barber III said.
Similar to Barber III’s mission of preserving his family’s history through the Vera Brown Farm Project, Roach and Cain are working to restore the Indigenous community’s physical and spiritual connection to their seeds in the interest of becoming more, “environmentally, culturally, economically, and health conscious.” Roach and Cain feel as though they have made great progress as seed growers, evidenced by their small production room in their home that is brimming with their unique seed collection that they grow, package and send to their large customer base on their own.
“Lots of beans. Lots of corn. Lots of herbs. Okra, leaks, lots of greens, lots of lettuce,” says Roach “Peppers, peppers, peppers. Literally everyone is like we will come to you.”
Roach and Cain are in need of more room to expand to fulfill the demands of their company that serves their community and independent growers, like Sparks, who is a follower of theirs on Instagram and is a big proponent of supporting indigenous agriculturalists.
“For one thing, you are supporting indigenous community and you're getting a lot more unique variety of crops,” Sparks said.
Barber III says that including members of the community, especially those in the indigenous community who understand the earth and the implications of land loss plays an important role in his goal of fulfilling the dreams of his ancestors in a socially and environmentally responsible manner. He hopes that offering them the tobacco mill, which is in need of restoration, but is spacious enough to house Roach and Cain’s growing business, is one of the first steps to actualizing his goals for the Vera Brown Farm Project.
The tobacco mill on Barber III's plot of land that he is offering to Roach and Cain.
“As we seek to deploy solutions that meet our current crisis, recognizing that it is not a thing that we do from scratch. Thinking about the legacy of what we’re looking to do in Piney Woods, thinking about the connection to my grandfather and the work that he did as a man before his time. Work that was often unappreciated and undervalued even in his own life that we are now resurrecting and seeing the values as we really approach this brave new world and really continue to try to act on this belief and possibility,” Barber III said.
William Barber III is not the first with the vision of repurposing Black-owned land for the benefit of marginalized communities. Bing and Myisha Turner, a former Public Health research analyst and law enforcement officer, respectively, attempted a similar feat in 2019 in a small town in Shreveport, Louisiana, called Cotton Valley.
The Turners’ journey to giving back to their community by providing access to fresh food in low-income neighborhoods has been a long one. In 2004, Bing Turner opened Heritage Education Group in Claremont, California, the brainchild of his future string of farmers markets owned by him and Myisha, in honor of his native Compton, a place that he said has a rich history of agriculturalism. The idea of the Heritage Education Group was to provide local, low-income Black children the opportunity to learn about agriculturalism and healthy habits.
Five years later, the couple’s son had been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, which they believe was caused by low food access in their community. The diagnosis inspired them to open their first farmers market in Los Angeles, and they’ve since opened 5 farmers markets across Southern California and have experienced great success.
In 2019, the two were visiting Myisha’s parents in Shreveport, Louisiana, when they realized the small town of Cotton Valley, where 70% of the population is Black and where many of Myisha’s family members lived, had very little access to fresh food.
Realizing what this meant for the health of this community and considering the success they experienced in Southern California, the Turners decided to bring what they thought the community of Cotton Valley needed. That year they bought a vacant gas station and in August 2021 they opened Bernice’s Grocery Store, named after Myisha’s grandmother, a Cotton Valley native.
Bing and Myisha Turner at Bernice's Grocery Store in Cotton Valley, Louisiana.
The Turners said they set out to be intentional about their market, knowing that the small community was not keen on outsiders nor were they used to markets that provided what they were severely lacking. They hosted focus groups with locals and conducted meetings with stakeholders to try to find out what the community wanted out of their store. That’s why when they opened, they were stunned by the lack of community support.
The shelves were neatly stocked with the items, untouched, that the community had requested In April 2022, just a year later, the Turners were forced to shutter after a year. The couple says all they could think about was what they did wrong.
“They said the store was too nice,” said Bing.
By speaking with community members, Bing and Mysiha learned that it was not enough to set up shop in the community to solve much deeper social ills that plagued the people of Cotton Valley.
“There is a need for psychological and social resources,” said Bing.
Through their experience the Turners learned that the community was in need of much more than fresh fruits and vegetables. Cotton Valley needed a holistic overhaul of support that they were not equipped to provide.
While Barber III continues to plant seeds of hope with the Vera Brown Farm, the future of Black land ownership and agriculturalism depends on reclamation and thoughtful community resources. Bing quotes Nipsey Hussle in saying that caring for low-income communities is “a marathon."
“If you’re doing this kind of work, you need to set your expectations early on and you need to be in for the long haul,” Bing says.