Ira Wallace
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Ira Wallace | |
|---|---|
 Wallace, far-left, and other members of Acorn Community Farm, 2005 | |
| Education | New College of Florida |
| Occupation | Organic gardener |
| Website | www |
Ira Wallace is a gardener, teacher and author.[1] She manages Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, a cooperatively-owned seed company.[2][3][4]
Wallace played a role in the making of the 2014 film documentary Open Sesame – The Story of Seeds, an eye-opening account highlighting the obstacles that some of the most notable non-GMO seed proponents face in their quest to keep seeds from becoming sovereign property solely controlled by powerful entities.[5] The film can be seen on Amazon Prime Video.[6]
Wallace has served as a board member for the Virginia Association for Biological Farming, Open Source Seed Initiative and Organic Seed Alliance. She was the recipient of the 2016 Craig Claiborne Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2019 American Horticultural Society's Paul Ecke Jr. Commercial Award and the 2019 recipient of the Organic Growers School's Organic Educator Award.[7][8]
Wallace was raised in Tampa, Florida, by her grandmother Estella Brown. Her grandmother taught her how to raise chickens and how to grow a wide variety of edible plants in a large garden. At an early age, Wallace realized that she had a passion for gardening.[9]
During the 1960s, she attended New College in Sarasota, Florida. (Her grandmother died the year she went to college.) A Southern Foodways Alliance article stated that "Wallace designed her own major and dug deep into the philosophy and practice of cooperative education and living." She left Florida after graduating from college, "traveled the world, exploring organic agriculture, seed saving, and cooperative living."[10]
