PRESCOTT — A decades-long Arizona tradition comes to an end today when Young's Farm in Dewey sends its last free-range turkey home for Christmas dinner.
The Young family has sold the 325-acre site and plans a move to Oregon. That ends what has become a family tradition for generations of Arizonans, heading to the site for festivals, school field trips or to pick a Halloween pumpkin right from the patch or a turkey for Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner.
The Young family tried but failed in several attempts to find a way to save the farm by putting it in a conservation easement. A community effort to raise money to preserve the site landed a $1.25 million federal grant, but couldn't come up with the matching funds and the effort fizzled.
Started in 1946, Young's Farm grew from a family effort into a commercial and agricultural venture that had 60 full-time employees. It became one of the biggest tourist attractions for Dewey, a community with fewer than 7,000 residents.
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More than 150,000 people routinely visited the farm during its pumpkin festival in October alone, and to visit the restaurant, bakery and gift shops. But the centerpiece of the operation was about 25,000 turkeys raised each year, free range and hormone- and antibiotic-free.
Hope had existed that Young's Farm might continue to supply turkeys, but the family was unable to negotiate a contract that would have made it economically feasible to do so.
That means this afternoon will see the final turkeys headed home with families that drive miles for the nostalgia of picking up their holiday meal at a real working farm.
Elaine Watkins of Phoenix drove to Dewey with her husband Thursday, and lamented the loss of her family's tradition.
"We've been buying turkeys from Young's Farm every year for 20 years or more," Watkins said.
