WINDHAM – It is just past 5 p.m. on a Tuesday evening and there are no spots left in the small parking lot next to Hawkes Farm Stand, just below the Windham rotary on Route 302. Desperate for a spot, tourists and locals alike are parked in the breakdown lane in front of the stand, hazards flashing.
“You never know what the day will bring,” said Florence Hawkes, owner of the popular farm stand, referring to the crowd. “That sort of makes it interesting.”
Supported by neighbors and out-of-state regulars, the stand has continued for eight decades.
“My father started this stand in 1932,” said Bob Hawkes, who, with his mother and sister, does all the growing and works the stand. “I don’t think he thought it would be around this long.”
Frank Hawkes was born and raised in Windham and spent his youth working his parents’ farm just about 1 mile down from where the stand currently sits. At 14, he decided to take the fruits of his family’s labor and sell them to his neighbors and passers-by. The original farm stand was built where the now-closed rest area is on Route 302, but more than a decade in, Hawkes decided to move it to a better spot.
“In 1948 we moved it down the street at 5 a.m. without a permit,” Florence Hawkes said while laughing. “We have been right in this spot ever since.”
After marrying, Frank and Florence Hawkes grew the business together going into partnership with Frank’s brother for a short time and then buying him out to work it again with their immediate family. Frank and Florence worked the farm and sold fruits and vegetables at the stand until Frank’s death in 2004.
“Our plan had always been to close the stand when he passed,” said Hawkes. “Well, the kids just loved it too much, so here we are.”
Frank and Florence’s son Bob and daughter Diane now help run the farm and the stand.
“We love the people,” said Bob Hawkes. “That’s what it’s about. Talking with people we know, meeting new people, we love it.”
Florence Hawkes agrees.
“I know people that have been coming here since Frank started the stand,” she said. “Now we have their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren that come here. It’s wonderful.”
Hawkes Farm Stand offers a variety of fruits and vegetables including tomatoes, cucumbers, several kinds of potatoes and squashes, zucchini, pickling cukes, green beans, corn, peas, peaches, blueberries, blackberries, apples and melons. Although most of the produce is grown on the Hawkes farm, other local farms also provide some products such as fruit and berries.
“We ripen the fruit and have it ready for customers but we don’t grow it,” said Florence Hawkes. “People like to be able to eat the fruit when they buy it, not wait for it to ripen at home, so we try to ripen it up so they can eat it right away.”
Hawkes points out that they pick produce from their gardens and bring it to the stand daily.
The most popular items by far are corn and tomatoes, a fact that on this humid day an unhappy customer learned rather quickly.
“I’m sorry,” Bob Hawkes said to the customer. “The police chief just scooped up the last of the tomatoes. We’ll have more tomorrow.”
Although they stay in business, the farm stand certainly doesn’t provide the same kind of income a 9-5 job would.
“It’s not a money-making scheme,” said Bob Hawkes. “But I love the work, I love the people and we manage to get by.”
After 80 years, they have no definite plans to reopen or remain closed after the season, they just take it day by day.
“You never know, this could be our last year,” Florence Hawkes said with a sly smile. It’s also a phrase her husband used to say every season when someone asked if he would be back in the spring.
“Dad used to say that all the time,” chuckled Bob Hawkes. “I think he meant it. You just never know if it’ll work out or not, but we’ll be here.”
The stalwart owners of the long-running Hawkes Farm Stand in
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