The Archive of

The Berry Center

 

and The Tanya Amyx Berry Agrarian Library

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Collecting and preserving works that offer compelling insights into good farming and land use and the rich culture of rural communities over the last century.

Archiving An Agrarian History

Welcome to the archive and the library at The Berry Center, established in 2011 in New Castle, Kentucky for the purpose of acquiring, cataloging, and preserving the papers of lawyer, farmer civic leader, and president of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association, John M. Berry, Sr. and his sons, author Wendell Berry and former Kentucky state senator, John M. Berry, Jr.

In addition to the archive we house a library and reading room, gallery space, and programming to further the agrarian arts and champion the enduring agrarian tradition, a tradition of literature, culture, good husbandry and sustainable practices. Our archive and library serve as institutional support for the administration and staff of the Berry Center in our work and as a support for instruction and the students in The Wendell Berry Farming Program of Sterling College and the development of cooperative farming around beef cattle with the Our Home Place Meat initiative.

Our Values

The mission of the Berry Center archives accords with the mission of The Berry Center in acquiring, cataloging, and preserving in perpetuity the record of the literary, agricultural, legislative, and cultural work of the Berry Family. We  will make these records available to all people regardless of education, philosophy, occupation, economic level, or background who are interested in agrarianism and farming. In addition, we  will provide research support and programming to promote an informed public understanding of agrarianism and the long tradition of philosophy to which agrarians belong.

The mission of the Tanya Amyx Berry Agrarian Library is to make available books in the agrarian tradition – fiction and non-fiction – to appeal to the public, to support scholarship in the Wendell Berry Farming program – teaching and learning – and the research needs of our institution.

The papers of John M. Berry, Sr.,  Wendell Berry, and John M. Berry, Jr. and the books in the Agrarian Library provide a touchstoneforall our work. Vital manuscripts and correspondence are guideposts. Books from agrarian writers provide up-to-date information aswe work torealize a vision of protecting the livelihoods of small farmers, restoring the countryside, making it possible for farmers to be able to farm well on prosperous and productive farms, and supporting our rural communities and restoring them to vitality.

    John M. Berry Sr. and his sons, John M. Berry Jr. and Wendell Berry, at the Berry Home Place in Henry County, KY
    Knife, from For The Hog Killing, 1979 by Tanya Amyx Berry, part of the photographic collection of the Archive of The Berry Center
    The Archive of The Berry Center holds a substantial collection relating to the Producer's Program of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association
    Many documents on the farming history of Kentucky and the nation are preserved in the Archive of The Berry Center
    The archive holds the personal papers of John Marshall Berry, Sr., John Marshall Berry, Jr., Wendell Berry, and many others.
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    Support The Berry Center

    Years Of History

    Preserved in The Archive Of The Berry Center, informing agrarian thought and practice, helping to chart a way forward for sustainable farming and rural prosperity.

    Young Farmers

    Working towards a full-time, tuition-free sustainable farming degree right here in Henry County, Kentucky, in our Wendell Berry Farming Program of Sterling College

    Agrarian Books

    Distributed by the Agrarian Literary League, a nationally recognized adult rural reading program from the Agrarian Culture Center and Bookstore at The Berry Center

    Acres conserved

    By Our Home Place Meat farmers, raising and processing the best livestock locally and humanely in a program based on the Burley tobacco cooperative model.

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