Woman grows 10-pound sweet potato, continuing the family tradition

Rebecca Ford recently harvested a 10-pound sweet potato using techniques passed down through four generations. And it's sure to be the talk of the table during the family Thanksgiving dinner.

"When we were digging this sweet potato up, my father, Chuck Miles, and I were just so amazed to keep seeing more and more come out of the ground," recalled Ford. "He was just so excited to be there with me and see this."

Harvesting years of memories

Miles, 79, and his late wife, Linda, always had a love for gardening and involved the whole family of eight in the process of growing their own vegetables on their quarter-acre home garden in Ringgold, Maryland, located just south of Waynesboro over the Pennsylvania line.

"We started at a young age, helping my parents," said Ford, who lives farther west in Cascade, Maryland. "I have fond memories of us going out and collecting the potatoes like we were on a Easter egg hunt ... I have always loved gardening, it's in my family's blood."

Miles can remember the days in the sun, toiling the soil until it was just right. "Our family had been gardening for many years, and my wife and I decided in 1966 to do what my parents used to do," Miles recalled.

"I would dig a deep hole in the ground and layer it with manure and soil until we had a big mound. We did it out of necessity, and we pretty much lived on what we got out of the garden, and what I would bring home from hunting."

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During the 1960s and 70s, the family property was adorned with pear, peach and walnut trees as well as a flourishing garden. "It was a lot of hard work, but it's worth your while to have the harvest and all of the produce to can," Ford said.

"It was a simpler time, my grandmother and my mother taught me how to can vegetables at home, and it's a tradition that I have since passed down to my daughter, Ashley Ford."

In 2012, Miles' wife, Linda, passed away, and the treasured family tradition was in jeopardy after losing the matriarch of the operation. "After mom passed away my dad didn't have the motivation to keep gardening because it was something that my parents did together for so many years," Ford said.

"I asked him if I could take over the garden, and he said it was OK; it turned out to be a great way to spend time with him and to honor mom."

Ford has been planting and harvesting a garden at her parents' home each year, continuing to fertilize the decades-old soil. "I wanted to keep the tradition alive. We have pictures of us grandkids helping our grandparents in that same garden."

Breaking the family record

In the 1970s, Miles was featured in a Central Pennsylvania newspaper, The Record Herald, for his harvest of a seven-pound sweet potato.

"He was so proud of that sweet potato. Up to that point, it was the largest one he had ever grown," Ford said. "He was so happy to have been in the paper, too."

It wasn't until this past harvest that the family record was topped by the 10-pound spud that his daughter grew in the same soil worked by the family for decades.

"After we got it out of the ground, we took it down to my aunt's house who's my dad's neighbor to weigh it, and we couldn't believe it — 10 pounds." Ford read the scale and checked it again. "I thought to myself, 'that could feed the whole family at Thanksgiving. God really blessed our family this year, even with the lack of rain, our garden still flourished."

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Continuing the tradition

Ford, and her children, Ashley and Logan, now share in the decades-old tradition. "To me it's an honor to continue this tradition, it's always been a way of life in our family. We grow our plants, plant them and pick them," Ashley said.

Her grandfather added, "It makes me feel good that they are carrying the tradition on," Miles said. "It's not only beneficial having those canned vegetables during the winter, but it's rewarding to be able to grow your own food; I'm pleased that they are willing to do that, and I hope it continues on long after I'm gone."

In addition to sweet potatoes, the family had a large harvest of tomatoes, butternut squash, carrots, green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, and a variety of peppers and cucumbers, most of which need to be canned. "This year was a big year. We have canned hundreds of jars of vegetables already, and we still have work to do," Ford said.

She credits her bountiful harvest to techniques her father passed down as well as modern techniques that she calls, "lasagna fertilizing — a process in which you layer the soil with cardboard, dirt and grass clipping as well as with manure and just keep making those layers until you have enough built up," Ford explained. "I think having the cardboard in the ground is what kept the soil moist during the periods of no rain this year."

Although the 10-pound sweet potato is far less than the world record of 81 pounds 9 ounces, according to Guinness World Records, it's much heavier than the average one of about 4 to 6 ounces.

And the locally grown sweet potato will do just fine for Thanksgiving dinner.