By Ron Wilson, director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at Kansas State University.
From pitches to plants. From hardballs to hibiscus. From the strike zone to the root zone. Those phrases are a way of describing the transition made by a Major League Baseball player who, with his daughter, has developed one of the leading plant nurseries in the nation.
Lyndsi Oestman is vice president of Loma Vista Nursery in Ottawa, Kansas. She shared this remarkable story.
Lyndsi’s dad, Mark Clear, grew up in California where he worked at his best friend’s family’s avocado ranch. Mark enjoyed tree pruning and avocado picking. He also enjoyed baseball. In fact, he was such a good player that he was drafted into Major League Baseball as a pitcher.
While being developed in the minor leagues, he was playing in Des Moines when he met the young woman who would become his wife. He went on to a 17-year major-league career, serving as a two-time all-star relief pitcher for the California Angels, Boston Red Sox and Milwaukee Brewers.
Continue reading “Kansas Profile – Now That’s Rural: Lyndsi Oestman, Loma Vista Nursery”
