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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 4, 1985)
^ > U CA V ■4; > O ^ "O .•nj| ■g c ^ be S t- > — Cj i- J= ii c S3 C c c -1 £ O ” w 0 «=!c^ rt-c ^ T- c ^ « 3 « ^ 2 ^ £ -2 -5 ^ = 7-o' s ”,-o " _ £X^^-5 -3 ^ iT'o — 3 (U (L> >. i; r- -3- Q .t3 !T, r—< 3. _. /i j _ •^5 5 be C £ S w ^ - ^-3 S=C^ 5-2 S -S £.« g-si: 3: ;« ■- S 3 £rs S--2 c c ►—< QJ 3 W > li __ j= o •£ y«t)(JC/5 w i2 o « S x: 5 '~~ 'U* ts> QJ ^ 3 = S b -2 rt w (U ce *3 : x: 2 « 2 c !i S o ■S £ $rjy C S c a u i c * <i x 03 2 d_ a.- ' C Ke 2 ! ga-Ex’ ' 5 I E ^ V bC r- ^ C qj ^ *a c ^ C V £ 7=; ^ S-« Q- r- O O w 03 e\£ u 0 < g c ^ <L> ^ (U 73 ^ O a> hT > 2 — -s X ^ 1> c ^ hr® > 3 I 'O r-x ” K ^ "c _ I • 3 .SP c . C 3 "3 —. U ® u tl (jJ • 2 ^ <L/ g T3 c s £ J 5 r 1 .£ CL,O50iCJxOX £ £ '• i>".. gii y vj 2 ole^gSoigg cJg2 r o-2E uaJ J^ • g !«• S-c* I I? « U .2 be — X JS The Peaceable Kingdom teaches life on the lands \ By TRICIA PARKER StaffWriter There are those wlio'd say the people of the Peaceable Kingdom are throwbacks but Director Libbie Winston dis agrees. And if their ideas, like the Kingdom itself, are a little off the beaten track, it's all right because that’s the way they like it. “The air is clean, the water is clean and the food tastes good,” she savs. “We’re not throwbacks, we're throwfor- wards.” The Peaceable Kingdom is a school and a community found three miles north of Washing- ton-on-the-Brazos. It serves as home base to four full-time staff members and a home to what seems like a dozen large mutts, a coop full of chickens, a rooster named Einstein and, until lunchtime last Sunday, a pig named Junior. The Kingdom also uses na ture as a tool to teach self-suffi ciency. What they have they built themselves and what they eat they grow. “When we need to do some thing, to build something, we find a wav to do it,” she says. So if the dwellings and life style are as rustic as the road, that’s the point — they built it themselves. The Kingdom began as 152 acres of meadows and woods. Everything else, including the communal kitchen, a prize winning barn, an igloo-shaped solar shower and a stained glass outhouse, the residents later added themselves. Now, the Kingdom is a hodge-podge of stylistically dif ferent buildings splattered at random around the hills and trees and animal pens of the Kingdom. In the 13 years since the Kingdom was formed, the in terests of the staff has been al most as widely scattered. This diversity contributed greatly to the growth of the community. Once someone was inter ested in potting so they built a kiln. When a blacksmith was in residence, they built a forge. Now one staff member, Lyn don Felps, is interested in en ergy conservation so as a result, the farm has a solar green house, hot water heater and a few solar lights. When I found Libbie she had half a dozen Bov Scout leaders in tow. As she wandered across the overgrown- tracks, from time to time she bent and fin gered an herb which moments ago I'd trampled as weeds. The scout leaders scribbled madly as she pointed out Shepards Purse (to stop bleeding), Red Clover (to purge the blood), and other edible plants. We wandered around and %-fien I found Libbie sfiefodfdf a dozen ‘Boy Scout [coders in tow. %s site wandered across the overgrown traces, from time to time sfie Sent and fingered an herb which moments ago I'd trampled as weeds. ate pepper grass and butter- cups and as the morning lesson came to an end it became ap parent that Libbie Winston knows an awful lot about ev- eiything. As a group, we returned to the main house for lunch. The weatherbeaten building, deco rated with odds and ends of stained glass, is the oldest part of the farm, and looks it. The decor is as eclectic as the people themselves. In the ply wood bookcase against one wall, the Better Homes Cook book stands next to Zen Tech niques, and an old Spirograph is stacked on stacks of albums. The cheap stereo with good speakers played Emerson, Lake and Palmer in the background. With lunch on the wav, the communal kitchen was crammed with people. Each one is hurrying to prepare the meal, namely a former pet named Junior. Libbie took me to the store room, it was packedWith more full shelves and glass jars than any biology lab. Sticks of cinna mon, bags of spices, nicotine- free cigarettes and a variety of wines (red tomato, honey and jalapeno) completed the collec tion. We visited the herb drying room which was like a giant potpourri and by the time we emerged, the “Junior-burgers” were ready and a vast noisy meal began. Just then a minor pandemo nium of squalking chickens and barking dogs broke out outside. Libbie was off, loping across the room. With a shout, the dogs stopped pursuit and Libbie settled unruffled onto the wooden bench to explain. “Those dogs are borders,” she says. “Our dogs don’t chase the chickens. The chickens have a way of flying just out of reach that drives them crazy.” Talking to Libbie, you get the feeling she knows because she asked the dogs. Libbie says the school is a sort of community service. “People come out here to get a look around,” she savs. “So metimes they leave you a dona tion and sometimes they don't but it doesn’t really matter.” What is important, she savs, is that people come out to learn. Libbie says the emphasis of the school changes from time to time but it is always cen tered on the land. A few years ago, for instance, the commu- nitv decided it needed a barn. “The original design was on a paper napkin,” she said. “We built it Tom Sawyer-style.” About 40 architects from Houston and the University helped build the art-deco- see page 12 evens are Kingdom residents -9-