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Jeff Allen is the former brewmaster of
Stone City Brewing Company, late of Solon, Iowa, where he still
resides with his wife, Sal. Tim Rask was one of the first
regular patrons at the brewery, and served as unofficial activities
director. Jeff and Tim hope to turn the story of Stone City
Brewing into a book someday.
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Rob Cline is the marketing director for
The University of Iowa's Hancher Auditorium. He is also the
founding president of the Iowa Cultural Corridor Alliance and
an active freelance writer. He lives in Cedar Rapids with his
wife Jenny and his children, Bryan, Jessica and Emily. |
Fifth-generation Iowan Susan Futrell comes
from a family with roots in farming, and has lived in Iowa City
since she was old enough to vote. She spent 25+ years in marketing
and sales with a locally-based organic foods distributor, and
is now a freelance writer and sole proprietor of One Backyard,
providing writing, marketing and research on sustainable food
systems. She also works part-time for Red Tomato, a Boston-area
nonprofit supporting small fruit and vegetable farmers. She
has an MFA in nonfiction writing from UI, and her current ambition
is to someday bake a perfect apple pie.
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Eugenia E. Gratto lives and writes in
Iowa City. She moved to Iowa in September 2005 from the Washington
D.C. area, where she sang in a rock band, divided her loyalties
between
the Washington Nationals and the Baltimore Orioles, and once
paid $18 for six heirloom tomatoes at a farmer’s market.
Shortly after she arrived in the Midwest, she decided it was
high time she learned how to grow her own tomatoes. She chronicles
her adventure in gardening, cooking, and living in Iowa on her
blog, The Inadvertent Gardener, which can be found at www.TheInadvertentGardener.com |
| Jennifer Hemmingsen planted her first
garden when she was four years old and even though they’re
not glamorous, johnny jump ups are still her favorite flower.
When not digging in the dirt, she’s a freelance writer
in Iowa City. |
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Brian Morelli is a journalist who covers
university news for the Iowa City Press-Citizen. A recent University
of Iowa graduate, Morelli has a major in journalism and minor
in political science. Prior to writing, Morelli traveled for
several years primarily in the U.S. and Canada, and he cooked
professionally at several restaurants across the country, most
recently at Devotay. He currently resides in Iowa City with
his wife and two children. |
| Criss Roberts, a Chicago native, married
into an Iowa farm family. She lives in Burlington, where she
is feature editor of the Hawk Eye, and writes for other publications
and websites. She is also a contributor to www.EssentialIowa.com |
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Mallory Smith is a native of Iowa City.
She has a BA in Home Economics from the University of Iowa and
an MBA from Western Illinois University. Her interest in food
and business has led to a variety of noteworthy jobs including
Peace Corps Volunteer, Guest Services Director for the Kellogg
Center for Rural Development in Honduras and Deli Manager at
New Pioneer Co-op. Smith owns and manages M Smith Agency, a
business that helps clients such as Practical Farmers of Iowa-Buy
Fresh, Buy Local, Eulenspiegel Puppets and Midwest Community
Development Institute to develop and market their services.
Smith lives in West Liberty with her husband Jose and three
sons: Erik, Tony and Diego. |
| Jay Wagner is a writer in Des Moines who
focuses much of his attention now on covering
food, travel and tourism in Iowa. He is a native of Sibley in
northwest Iowa and has years
of newspaper experience with the Northwest Iowa Review, Sioux
Falls Argus-Leader and
Des Moines Register, and also for a time was editor of The Iowan
magazine. He publishes
www.EssentialIowa.com,
which covers all there is to know and more about Iowa. Jay is
married to CeCe Wagner, an attorney, and they also have a daughter,
Zoey, and a son,
Kiernan. |
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Leah Wilson is the Coordinator for the
Johnson County Local Food Alliance ( JCLFA),
a new organization fostering a more sustainable food system
in Johnson and
surrounding counties. JCLFA brings the Buy Fresh Buy Local campaign
to Johnson
County and coordinates Field to Family. (www.jclfa.org)
Leah is currently working on
her master’s thesis in Geography at the University of Iowa,
focused on the sustainability
of the University of Iowa food system. At home, Leah engages
in freestyle, haphazard,
micro-scale farming adventures. When not interrogating mystery
plants in her garden,
she can probably be spotted out in the pasture, cavorting and
carrying on with her 3
dairy goats, heritage poultry and 2 organic, free-range children. |
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