According to a 1990 report in the Courier Journal, there were 935 black-owned farms in Kentucky in 1982.  In 1987 the number had shrunk to 673, a 28 percent decline, while white-owned farms declined by 9 percent.  Mattie Mack is a Brandenburg tobacco farmer and activist who has worked to reverse these statistics.  Her first efforts to buy a farm in Kentucky resulted in refusal because she was black.  In 1963 she and her husband were finally able to purchase their farm because a black owner sold directly to them. 

Mattie Mack is a woman for whom farming has been the only way of life, and she is on a mission to remind Kentuckians of the value of tobacco and the black farmer.  For instance, in 1990 she successfully petitioned the Kentucky legislature to pass a bill providing loans to small farmers, and championed the inclusion of minority rights in the 1990 U.S. Farm Bill.  In 1998 she expressed her concerns about the future of tobacco farmers to President Clinton when he visited Kentucky, and joined him in speaking out against teen smoking at a school.  Mattie Mack serves as a role model for young women interested in continuing the Kentucky farming tradition.

Learn about the Kentucky Agriculture Women's Leadership Network.