Hamilton developed a crush on a farmer, she recalls with a laugh — and that explains a lot. But there was something else that turned her on: "[the idea of] food and agriculture as this way of enacting your beliefs about the way the world should be," she says.

"Having a human involved in agriculture means that human is bringing these elements that only a human can — things like caring about history and caring about the future and being able to quantify value beyond dollars and bottom line."