The article below was published in the daily newspaper The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA, page 46, August 24, 1980.
See the case file here.
|
VALLE DE SANTIAGO, Mexico - Mexico's wonder farmer, J. Carmen Garcia, has been deluged with questions about how he produces 60-pound cabbages, 10-pound onions and collard greens the size of palm fronds.
Yet the Mexican government lost interest when he offered to tell his secret to help feed the poor, and now Garcia's secret, what he calls "the method," has been entrusted to the mystical Rosicrucian Order of San Jose, Calif.
Garcia, whose perennial giant vegetables made him a folk hero in his Guanajuato state valley 260 miles northwest of Mexico City, was challenged by Agriculture Ministry agronomists in a grow off in December 1977.
The context, on identical side-by-side plots, was conducted at the ministry's Tangasneque experimental station near Tampico. When the April 1978 harvest was in, the unschooled farmer and his associate, Oscar Arredondo, had put the government agronomists to shame. Yet, the results virtually were suppressed and the government did not follow up with Garcia, who returned somewhat embittered to his valley.
A ministry spokesman said, "In cabbage alone, Garcia outgrew the agronomists 107 tons per hectare (2.5 acres) to five tons per hectare. However, government experts determined that his large produce was less nutritious than normal-sized produce and the government decided not to pursue the matter."
PERHAPS THE government was put off by Garcia's steadfast avowal that his success came from contemplating a formula of symbols on a scap of paper given him by a stranger who claimed to have been held captive in an underground city by extraterrestrial beings.
Oscar Arredondo, co-owner with Garcia of the wonder farm was more informative: "The secret is that the seeds are energized before planting. The chosen depository for the benefit of humanity is the Rosicrucian Order."
