Corsicana Daily Sun, Corsicana, Texas

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June 8, 2007

From nature to your table

Fairfield’s Cooper Farms a roadside regular in summer

By Chase Springer

What’s red and orange and seen all over?

Answer: Cooper Farms peach trucks found along Interstate 45 from Ennis to Madisonville.

What started as a little store in Fairfield that sold produce on the “honor” system has now grown into an area-wide business that furnishes the residents of Navarro and surrounding counties with fresh-grown peaches and other produce.

“It started out as a little store on I-45 where all the produce was put on shelves with a price tag and a money slot under it,” said Sandy Douglas, handling sales from a truck in Corsicana. Douglas is also a special education teacher at Fairfield Middle School. “Customers would put the cost of the produce in the slot and take what they paid for.

“It has just grown and grown. It’s a little success story. Now Cooper Farms goes all the way down to Madisonville and even sells to H-E-B.”

Business owner Tim Cooper began a career of picking peaches at age 12 as a summer job at Fairfield Farms. He bought the farm after the previous owner Ralph K. Alexander passed away. Cooper planted 1,000 trees to create his first orchard in 1978.

From there, he and wife Kathy built Cooper Farms into a 10,000 tree, 12 greenhouse operation with a farm store and roadside-stand operation with multiple locations, growing and selling vine-ripened peaches, tomatoes, cucumbers, melons and other fruits and vegetables.

Cooper now hires residents of Fairfield — including a large number of teachers — to staff the numerous “peach stands” throughout the surrounding area.

“I love doing this,” Douglas said. “It supplements my teacher’s pay. There are several teachers that work for Mr. Cooper. He is a very good person to work for.”

Cooper Farms has been in operation since 1983 and insures the quality of its famous peaches and other produce with a guarantee to be top-quality or it will be replaced free of charge.

One of the many Cooper Farms peach trucks can be found at Mickey’s Exxon off of I-45 on Highway 287 in Corsicana.

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Chase Springer may be contacted via e-mail at chase@corsicanadailysun.com

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