Source: PRESS RELEASE, 7/7/19


Johnny Wishon didn’t grow up on a farm, but his father, a game warden, did. Wishon remembers, “We had a little over five acres of land, and my dad always had the biggest garden in the county. He would let me grow extra vegetables to sell to the local grocery store.” In high school he became involved in Vo-Ag, FFA, and agriculture classes, all of which steered him toward a farming career.

Majoring in agricultural education at North Carolina State University, Wishon spent summer breaks working on a local farmer’s Christmas tree farm and developed a passion for growing trees. After graduating in 1988, he started Wishon Evergreens, planting a few hundred trees on family land. It took ten years of working two jobs—as a tree farmer and as an agricultural science teacher at Alleghany High School—for Wishon to be able to farm full time.

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