Seventeen-year-old John Jorenby harvests organic peas on the massive Gunsmoke Farms, which covers some 54 square miles outside of Pierre, South Dakota. Jorenby works for Olsen Custom Farms, the largest contract harvester in the United States. The company’s fleet of million-dollar machines work ten-hour days from May to December following the ripening crops in North America’s breadbasket from Texas to Canada. Gunsmoke Farms, once owned by actor James Arness, star of the popular Western television series of that name, was bought by venture capital firm Sixth Street Partners in 2016 with plans to produce organic wheat and other crops for General Mills’ Annie’s macaroni and cheese. Poor weather, combined with excessive tillage that ignored soil conservation plans for the farm’s fragile soils, led to dust storms and severe erosion on the historic property in 2021. In 2023, the certified organic land was leased to a new manager for a mixture of organic and conventional farming.
