One of South Carolina’s most iconic crops soon will be growing at the South Carolina Governor’s School for Agriculture in a very special place.
Last September, when Hurricane Helene raked across the John de la Howe campus, the ferocious winds leveled a stand of Leyland cypress at the Eubanks Farm, named in honor of the late Martin Eubanks, former Assistant Commissioner of Agriculture in South Carolina. Soon, about 250 peach trees will be planted in place of the downed evergreens.
The trees have been donated by J.W. Yonce & Sons Inc., an Edgefield County-based producer of Big Smile brand peaches. Chris Yonce, owner of Big Smile Peaches, presented the first handful of juvenile peach trees to our facilities director Scott Mims earlier this week.
“The more we can get young people in agriculture, the better off this country will be,” Mr. Yonce said. “Agriculture is not going to survive on our generation alone. It takes young people to keep it going. I enjoy helping institutions like De la Howe that are helping make a difference in agriculture.”
J.W. Yonce & Sons is an enterprise with an 80-plus year history of its own, so Mr. Yonce is pleased his family tradition will be represented as part of the 278-year legacy of the John de la Howe School. His family also enjoyed a long friendship with Mr. Eubanks, whose family helped dedicate the memorial garden in May 2023.
“I’m really proud of everyone at De La Howe for making it what it’s becoming, putting it back on the map,” Mr. Yonce said. “It’s great that they’re getting young people in and growing that campus and that educational program…and Martin was a dear friend and a great guy and a great person for agriculture. He was a super guy.”
Eat A De La Howe Peach
Dr. Timothy Keown, our school president and superintendent, is eager to watch the colorful peach trees come to bloom near the front entrance of our campus.
“Peach production has an economic impact of over 80 million dollars in South Carolina and provides more than 1,000 full-time jobs,” Dr. Keown said, citing South Carolina Peach Council data. “Georgia may try to claim themselves as the peach state, but South Carolina remains the king of peaches in the Southeast. We are grateful to the Yonce family for the donation to our school. This will be an exciting addition to the agricultural program here!”
The new peach orchard also will help the school meet its goal of becoming at least 50 percent sustainable, with students and staff in our cafeteria eating food grown right here on campus. But over the long haul, there also could be a peach enterprise here one day, selling John de la Howe-branded peaches to the local community.
“With the amount of trees they have donated to us, it’s going to produce more than we’re going to be able to consume,” said Eric McCall, our farm manager. “So, if everything’s done right and it’s done well, I’m looking for that four to five years down the road. A peach stand plays into the vision of our market.”
The new peach trees from J.W. Yonce & Sons probably will start going into the ground sometime in the next few weeks, Mr. McCall said. Once those trees finally start to spring forth with their stunning pink peach blossoms, he added, “it’s going to give a nice visual effect, but it’s going to be practical, and it’s going to fit right into what we’re trying to do with sustainability.”