VIRGINIA'S FARMER IS TALL, BRONZE, HANDSOME

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| The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, Norfolk, VA, Oct 17, 2010 | by LINDA MCNATT

He is the man of my dreams. I knew he would be.

Dressed in bib overalls. His shirt sleeves rolled up past his elbows. If I look closely, I’m sure I’ll find a little sweat across his hard-working brow.

He’s the Virginia farmer. Not any specific farmer in any particular Virginia locality. Just an ordinary farmer, gazing out across his newly planted crops.

The bronze statue stands in the entry area of the Virginia Farm Bureau’s headquarters building. I read about it in a recent Farm Bureau news letter.

Finally, I thought, with what was probably an audible sigh of relief, a statue in Richmond without controversy. No battle flags. No weapons. No color of skin. No connections with any causes except honesty, hard work and a God-fearing respect for the land.

I wanted to know immediately what he looked like.

I’d read that he is 6 feet, 3 inches tall. I asked Bruce Stone , when I called the Farm Bureau offices near our state capital, if it was meaningful. Are all farmers tall?

Not necessarily, he answered me, with a chuckle, but the bronze man is as typical of a Virginia farmer as they could come up with.

“He’s big,” said Stone, a member of the committee that decided what the farmer would look like and who would sculpt him. “We had a vision. He would be gazing at the sky, wondering when the next rain would come.”

Now, doesn’t that sound just like a farmer?

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