Dawn to Dusk (2014)
Rainbow Hill Farm, Charles Town, WV

Gale Livingstone, who immigrated from Guyana as a child, left her full-time job with the Federal Government in 2011 to move to West Virginia and start farming. Inspired by a love of fresh food and her experience growing vegetables at a community garden in the Washington, DC, area, she and her partner purchased 19 acres that would become Rainbow Hill Farm.

At the close of her third full season of farming, Gale continues to struggle with growing a diverse mix of organic crops successfully given the composition of the soil on her land, a former horse farm. To make ends meet, she recently went back to work part-time at a desk job in DC, balancing her schedule with daily tasks on the farm and traveling to sell at several weekly farmers markets. In the summer of 2014, her mother moved in temporarily to help on the farm after an employee left midway through the season.

Gale dreams about starting a non-profit aimed at connecting urban youth to farming and food production. She is passionate about working the land and says she believes women can be successful farmers because “we tend to be more in tune with the environment. . . with the animals, with how things go together, and tend to be a little more attentive and more detail-oriented as far as organizing and planning our plantings. We’re willing to more take on the challenge of having diverse crops.”