Duplin Wine Cellars, now Duplin Winery, produced the first N.C. brandy since prohibition to stimulate the fledgling N.C. grape industry. The brandy, distilled from locally grown Carlos, Magnolia and Scuppernong grape varieties, was first marketed in 1982. North Carolina has since become the seventh-largest wine producer and ninth-largest grape producer in the country. To find out more […]
The commodity characters shown above were originally used for Down on the Farm, a play created by our Marketing Division in the 1990s to promote N.C. agriculture. Several costumes have fallen into disrepair over the past decade, but some are still used by the department and commodity associations for special events. Most recently, the Suzy Strawberry costume has appeared […]
Former Agriculture Commissioner Jim Graham visits with a contestant (and possible future contestant) in a State Farmers Market dairy milking contest. Although it hasn’t hosted any dairy milking contests lately, the State Farmers Market in Raleigh keeps a full calendar of events throughout the year, as well as the WNC market, Charlotte market, Piedmont-Triad market […]
When Alan Caldwell first started his marketing job just one month after the Western North Carolina Farmers Market opened in September 1977, there were only two buildings where 13 stand today. Caldwell, who is now an assistant manager, remembers one of then-Commissioner of Agriculture Jim Graham’s initial visits to the site. “He looked down the […]