Conceived
in 1976, Small Farmer's Journal is a large (11 x 14 inch) handsome
132 page black and white quarterly which is more community odyssey
than magazine. It is packed to over-full with more information
than you might find in three or four conventional magazines.
Supported 100% by its readership, this folksy and feisty publication,
a true clarion of free speech in the best old sense of the phrase,
has been a vibrant and exciting platform for engaging far-flung
ideas about anything pertinent to the small family farm experience.
Out
of a concern for the integrity of the editorial content of the
publication Small Farmer's Journal, two important decisions
were made and held to from the outset. Number one; SFJ would
strive to be inclusive and allow its pages to be a forum for
a wide ranging set of topics and agendas so long as a reverence
for life, honesty, deserved civility, decency, and tolerance
were displayed. Number two; SFJ would strive to protect its
pages and general efforts from the insidious pressures that
result from a reliance on advertising income. Advertising IS
editorial content and has, in SFJ, been treated as such from
the beginning.
For thirty plus years Small Farmer's Journal has flowed forth
with amazing consistency of purpose and form, diversity of content
and voice, and editorial strength. With a readership of 40,000
residing in every state of the union, every Canadian province
and 65 additional countries spread around the planet, over the
years more than 1.5 million copies of SFJ's issues have made
the case for small farms. Yet, even with this significant history,
SFJ remains a relatively unknown publication whose publicity
has traveled primarily by word of mouth.
