Rural Heritage June/July 2026

by Anna Knapp-Peck I vy Pagliari grew up in a small town in Northeast Ohio. She wasn’t an outdoorsy child, and her only pet was a parakeet. As an adult she moved often and traveled looking for something she hadn’t yet identified. She lived in California, traveled through Ireland, and was employed in China. In the early 2000s China was looking for people to teach English.Ivy described it as the wild west.There was little regulation and she found the job listing Ivy Pagliari

on Craig’s List. She was not an accredited teacher, but she had a firm grasp on the English language, so she was employed. The first year was spent outside of Shanghai, a fairly urban environment. When the term ended, she had to come back to the U.S. to renew her visa. She took a job on a vegetable farm in Vermont while waiting for her application to be approved. It was her first introduction to farming. During her second term, Ivy was sent to West China in the rural area of Ta Gong. The people there lived simply; animals were housed in the bottom of the

Frank and Sparrow hauling hay in 2022 in Walden, Vt.

Rural Heritage

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