Our Farm Team

Here are the field crew, the poultry gang, the chefs & prep cooks, the bread baker, the guy who fixes everything and the inn managers: L to R: Arnulfo, Ramon, Mary Ellen, David, Corey, Pauline, Tami, Taylor, Kevin and Laura.  Missing: Dan Wood

Pauline Lord moved to the farm with David in 2000 to begin clearing rocks from the field (only one back then) and growing some crops.  In California she had worked as a psychotherapist, waged legal battles against developers and  ran the conservation group Committee for Green Foothills. She loves raising produce and critters, dreaming up ways to expand the enterprise, working with the farm team and interacting with our community of customers.

David Harlow retired from the US Geological Survey in 1996 and began to cast about for his next career …. Which proved to be farming!  At the USGS in Menlo Park, he had been a key member of the rapid response team that was deployed to Nicaragua, Colombia and ultimately, in 1991, to the Philippines, where David predicted the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo, just in time.  At White Gate he heads up the beautification committee, thinning trees and repairing stone walls. As an undergrad at Dartmouth he was on the ski team and still loves the sport, but not as much as flying the tiny airplane he built himself.

 

 

Dan Wood joined the farm in March of 2021. He graduated from UConn in 2019 with a BS in Sustainable Agriculture, and in 2015 from the Culinary Institute of America.  He’s worked as a farm hand at Stone Acres, an apprentice at the Mystic Cheese Company and a prep cook at multiple restaurants, including The Treehouse at Oyster Club and White Crest Eatery.  He studied sustainable food systems in Florence Italy.  While Dan has his hands full managing our crop production, he loves to assist Tami with special dinners and teach flower arranging with Pauline.

 

 

Tami Grooney joined the team in 2016 and soon became our Head Chef.  She grew up in San Francisco where her parents opened an Asian-Fusion Bistro in North Beach which moved to the Castro where she became owner and manager.  She managed the kitchen for Three Stone Hearth in Berkeley and then cheffed at the Zen Hospice Project Guest House making organic food for the terminally ill.  She hired on as Chef for the bi-annual Women’s Herbal Symposium and then for the Buckeye Gathering, a primitive skills festival near Chico. She says: “In addition to working with beautiful, local, organic foods I had the privilege of leading a big crew in this intimate bubble of cooking, laughter, creativity and exhaustion…a recipe for deep connection, very good food and great memories.”  

 


Mary Ellen Forster joined us in 2019.  She had left the corporate world to pursue her passion for health supportive cooking.  A graduate of the Institute of Integrative Nutrition and the Natural Gourmet Chef’s Training Program, she is happily living the dream of working on an organic farm as part of the White Gate Farm kitchen team.   Mary Ellen also manages our online store operations and considers the marriage of her business and culinary skills the perfect professional match!

Kevin Gallagher joined the team in 2019 and is the Inn Manager and Baker, having mastered the large wood-fired oven.  He makes great pizzas too and is experimenting with other creations from that behemoth.  Kevin is a painter, a clothing designer, a drummer, and an instructor in Stand-Up Paddle boarding.  He plays soccer.   Kevin and his son Santé live on the farm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ramon and Laura Pacheco first came to the farm in 2006 through the H2A guest worker program, leaving their two young children with their parents in Nayarit, Mexico. In 2019 Ramon’s brother Arnulfo began to come as well.  They stay each year from May to November doing everything in the way of poultry management and crop production while maintaining a calm, efficient and cheerful presence.  With the money they have made here they have built their own house (Ramon is a stonemason) and purchased land and milk cows.  They are putting their son through dental school.

 

Corey Harlow, David’s older son, has been at the farm since 2003.  Here he is last but by no means least in that he has constructed or installed most of the infrastructure of the farm.  He knows building, plumbing, electrical work and more plus he keeps our 4 tractors, 4 golf carts and 1 dump truck running, mostly.  He is also the poultry manager.  His hobbies include hiking, rock and ice climbing, birding, camping and kayaking.