Rietveld Farms, Inc.

H I S T O R Y

Gerritt C. Rietveld first started farming on the fertile plains south of Chicago, Illinois, just after the turn of the century. Gerritt’s father, Cornelius R. Rietveld, was the son of Arie Rietveld, who emigrated from the Netherlands in 1864. Arie left the small village of Schellunien, near Gorichem, to settle in the newly incorporated town of South Holland, Illinois. The name, South Holland, was taken from the province of the same name in the Netherlands.

Gerritt Rietveld and his wife, Hattie (Anker) Rietveld, raised three sons during their marriage: Cornelius R., Claude Alan, and Glenn Rietveld. Gerritt, along with his three sons, would farm together until Claude’s death in 1953. Cornelius and Glenn would then form the farming corporation of G.C. Rietveld Sons, Inc. and would do business under that name until the mid 1970’s. The farm was now headquartered in Chicago Heights, IL, just south of South Holland.

Shortly after World War II, Glenn would learn to adapt many innovative changes to his growing operation. Only lacking the formal education of an engineer, Glenn would spend hours in the shop welding and fabricating new ideas into workable solutions. Glenn was instrumental in developing the first successful model of the now popular Harvest-Aid system, which was a simple traveling conveyor system that is still used to this today and is very popular in the intensively farmed vegetable valleys in the western United States. In 1960, worker safety and care were a concern for Glenn and his brother Cornelius, even before it became governmentally mandated. Glenn initiated the first Illinois governmentally approved “Labor Camp,” which featured all the modern plumbing and electrical conveniences that were known at that time. These new and modern apartments were to serve as the cornerstone for a grateful and eager workforce that migrated annually to the northern regions to labor in his fields.

New automated onion set crate handling - 1952

Glenn also designed and built the first bulk onion set storage that featured "artificial ventilation." This storage would house the annual production of onions in large mountains separated into their various colors and varieties. The chief method of curing and drying those onions was accomplished by utilizing several high horsepower ventilation fans that forced heated air into a high pressure plenum that served as the main artery for the lateral ductwork that lay beneath the large bulk piles. This eliminated the need for the traditional wooden onion set crates, and along with that, the need for the increasingly high-cost manual labor that associated itself with that "old school" system. Field harvesting operations became more streamlined as well. Glenn traveled to Europe and brought back with him the first, of what would be many, Dutch-manufactured onion set harvesters. Even to this day, this "new-age" harvesting and storage system is the standard worldwide.

However, there were a few bumps along the way. In December of 1968, the newly remodeled bulk storage warehouse burned down completely in just a matter of a few hours. A total of seven different fire departments from all across the immediate region watched helplessly as the old warehouse went up in smoke, which was seen, ironically, as far north as South Holland. A whole season’s worth of work lay inside her as she spewed flames and let black smoke tower into the blue winter sky. Later, as the smoke cleared, all that would remain were those same bulk piles of onions, which had been so thoroughly stored away earlier that summer. Nevertheless, Glenn & Cornelius would pick up the pieces and rebuild. However, now these two brothers would realize that this calamity was actually a blessing in disguise. They would rebuild with an eye towards the future . . . a future that would mean expansion and growth for G. C. Rietveld Sons, Inc., into the decade of the 1970´s. It was also during that decade that Glenn´s three boys would begin to leave the farm for the college campus and pursue the higher studies that Glenn could never afford. His three sons, Thomas Alan (1951-2004), David Claude (1955) and Daniel Glenn (1963), all grew up working on the farm until the time came when each one of them went away to college.

In 1977, the farm incorporated under the new name of Rietveld Farms, Inc. The farm headquarters had now shifted to the east, over the border, into Indiana, near the town of Kouts, about 45 miles from the former Chicago Heights location. The current headquarters for Rietveld Farms is located on the old "Libertyview" Farm in Morgan Township, Porter County, Indiana. Libertyview was noteworthy during a period of time from 1920 to 1960. Libertyview was the home of one of the largest dairy herds in Northern Indiana and served as the primary milk stop for the region’s fresh milk production. The Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Line, which intersects the Libertyview Farm, served as the primary conduit for that milk production to the large metropolitan markets in the Chicagoland area.

Also in 1977, Rietveld Farms became the first farm in Indiana to install electrically driven, center-pivot irrigation to water the higher value vegetable crops on the rich sandy-loam soil of the Kankakee River Valley. Many more of these irrigation "systems" would follow over the years and would serve as one of the key elements for taking vegetable and grain yields to new plateaus. Raised bed technology, fumigation, minimum tillage and computerization were implemented. Today, this type of technology is commonplace, but works along side the newer tools to be adapted on the farm, such as GPS, satellite-assisted field mapping and completely automated tractor steering. In 1985, David would become a trustee of the National Onion Association (Greeley, CO). Also that same year, David and his wife, Judy, were honored by the Indiana Farm Bureau as one of the five "Outstanding Young Farmers" in the State of Indiana.

In 1995, a new onion storage facility was built on the Kouts site, and one other brand new mechanical innovation was being installed. It was an onion "topper" from a little known company (at the time) called ERC Machinery. Rietveld Farms had been familiar with onion toppers in the past. However, once again, while in the "old country" of his ancestors, Glenn´s watchful engineering eye spotted this unique topping machine, and he was enthusiastically impressed. The result was that Rietveld Farms, Inc. would become the first U.S. business to import one of these new, innovative onion toppers. David was hired as a consultant shortly thereafter to assist ERC in developing a marketing and sales strategy within the U.S. This association with ERC Machinery, NL (Emmeloord) would begin a relationship that would establish ERC as one of the leading onion line manufacturers and installers in the United States today. Currently, ERC enjoys doing business in over 14 states and every major onion-growing region in the U.S. ERC Machinery, now a truly international manufacturing concern, conducts business on nearly every continent.

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