Liz Eagle Baldwin ’76
December 2017“Did you grow up on a farm?”
“No. I grew up in New York City. I went to Brearley.”
My aunt and two sisters went to Brearley before me. My aunt held the high jumping record for decades—up until the year I left, when one of my classmates finally broke it.
I left Brearley after ninth grade to go to boarding school. That’s what my sisters had done.
Then on to college. That’s what my siblings had done.
I wasn’t a pioneer. I was following the course. But really, I always wanted something different. Brearley had taught me that I could do anything. I could be anyone.
I don’t think my parents had being a farmer on their mind for me, but that’s what I became!
Dairy farming specifically. First in Maryland, then Wisconsin, finally, in Millbrook, NY, where I married the farmer who hired me. Now I had steered off the path! How could a woman, from NYC, be a dairy farmer? I was a Brearley girl—I could do anything.
Then I had children. Four children. Raised them on the farm, beside their parents. I homeschooled them. I wasn’t the first to do it, but it was very unconventional at the time.
Now, my youngest is in his final year at University of South Carolina. My husband died in 2002. We had worked side by side for decades. I needed to keep our farm going. I steered in another direction in 2010, selling raw milk from the farm. I’m not the first farmer to do it, but one of very few.
I’ve always been very proud to say I was a Brearley girl from NYC. I’m proud that Brearley gave me the courage to be a farmer, homeschooling mother, and business owner. All along, I seemed to be doing something that everyone else wasn’t doing, but, early on, Brearley taught me that I could do anything.