Over-Flight of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System’s Graham Farm and Nature Center!

My friend Tim Kelley, a licensed pilot for 44 years, graciously treated me to an overflight of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System’s Graham Farm and Nature Center in Jackson County’s Paint Rock River Valley. We departed Huntsville Executive Airport on August 22, 2026, at 2:00 PM under clear skies at 90 degrees Fahrenheit. My objective was to get a better overview of the Center, understand its topographic position within the Cumberland Plateau and Paint Rock River Valley, and appreciate the beauty, magic, wonder, and awe of this special place. We circled the 491-acre property at ~3,000′ altitude, 2,300′ above the valley floor and 1,300′ above the summit of Maxwell Mountain.

Tim rented a Cessna 172 Skyhawk, a fine machine for our aerial exploration.

 

We flew west from the airport to examine a property Tim wanted to see. We then flew to GF&NC, following Route 72 east to the county road leading north to the property. Our return flight was due west about 20 miles.

 

I recorded this 58-second video over GFNC.

 

We agreed to plan a repeat flight during the dormant season, when hardwood foliage no longer obscures ground features. Importantly, I will coordinate better with Tim in advance on the flight pattern needed to achieve the images I seek. I refer readers to the old saw that I’ve communicated about experience and learning:

• Experience is what you get right after you need it.
• We seldom learn by doing things right.

The property maps imposed on existing aerial photographs provide proper N/S orientation.

 

This image leans about 30 degrees east of north; the view is NNW. The pavilion, Connestoga overnight wagons, classroom, and kitchen headquarters unit occupy the open high ground at the upper left. Its position furnishes a clear view to the valley and the prominent ridge beyond.

 

My first on-the-ground visit to GF&NC evoked a sense of the Place and its Spirit. I viewed Graham from above through a spirit-filtered lens that reached back more than a century of family farming and 13 millennia, when Native Americans foraged, hunted, and farmed the valley and hillsides.

 

Wendell Berry, author, essayist, conservationist, and farmer, died August 31, 2026. I am still early in my evolving relationship with GFNC, yet I am embracing its beauty and spirit. I believe that Love is in the air!

We have the world to live in on the condition that we will take good care of it. And to take good care of it, we have to know it. And to know it and to be willing to take care of it, we have to love it. (Wendell Berry)

The property home-place sits to the left at woods’ edge, at the base of Maxwell Mountain.

 

This is the view to the east across the valley. We are banking above the Maxwell Mountain summit. The home-place is at lower right.

 

Now looking southwest, the home-place is straight ahead. The tree-identification trail we’re establishing is along the lower slope of Maxwell Mountain.

 

This view is to the northwest.

 

 

The valley extends northward from Graham.

 

This final view looks southeast toward the confluence of Larkin Creek and the Paint Rock River.

 

Mr. Berry never visited Graham Farm and Nature Center, yet he knew it well:

The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.

The primary motive for good care and good use of the land-community is always going to be affection, which is too often lacking.

Louis Bromfield, author of Pleasant Valley, his mid-20th-century non-fiction account of restoring soil health to his old worn-out Ohio Farm, wrote:

The adventure at Malabar is by no means finished…. The land came to us out of eternity, and when the youngest of us associated with it dies, it will still be here. The best we can hope to do is to leave the mark of our fleeting existence upon it, to die knowing that we have changed a small corner of this earth for the better by wisdom, knowledge, and hard work…

Tim and I flew again on October 23, 2026. We departed due east at 5:00 PM to have dinner with Tim’s brother Scott in Chattanooga. We ascended to 5,500′ altitude over the Paint Rock River Valley. I easily identified the aerial imprint of Graham Farm and Nature Center as it passed under me. I’ll be ready for our dormant season property overflight. We returned after dinner well after sunset, at 4,500′. Bright urban, suburban, and rural lights lay beneath us in succession as we departed Chattanooga. Then we entered the total darkness of the isolated Paint Rock River Valley. The Center is a special place, day or night!

 

In some small way, I hope to apply the power of my affection for the Place and the Spirit to the service of the Graham Farm and Nature Center Mission:

Graham Farm and Nature Center offers visitors educational experiences in agriculture and environmental stewardship. Explore farm tours, multiple hiking and biking trails, and hands-on learning opportunities, making it an ideal destination for families and nature enthusiasts to enjoy outdoor activities and scenic surroundings.

Thoughts and Reflections

 

I offer these observations:

• I view my engagement (with Graham Farm and Nature Center) as a calling, and a noble cause to sow seeds so that others might do their own part to change some small corner of this Earth for the better. (Steve Jones)

• The primary motive for good care and good use of the land-community is always going to be affection, which is too often lacking. (Wendell Berry)

• The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope. (Wendell Berry)

 

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied by untold orders of magnitude:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

• People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
• They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and understand their Earth home more clearly.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

 

Steve’s Four Books

 

I wrote my books Nature-Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2025) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature. All four of my books compile personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. They offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is, in large measure, my legacy to our two kids, our five grandkids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future