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GROWER OF THE MONTH By Tyrell Marchant I Photos courtesy Jim Coombs, LLC Staying Power Jim Coombs of Elmer, N.J. About 30 miles due south of Philadelphia sits the tiny borough of Elmer, N.J., population 1,395. A two-hour drive to the northeast will get you to Times Square; Baltimore is only an hour and a half away, and just beyond lies Washington, D.C. It is here, surrounded on the map by three of the nation's biggest media markets, that nine generations of Coombs family farmers have made their living. Jim Coombs owns and operates Jim Coombs, LLC, a 500-acre operation on 28 Potato Grower | DECEMBER 2013 which is grown potatoes, feed corn and pumpkins. His daughters, Jennifer Coombs, who serves as operations manager, and Amanda Coombs-Shimp, the office manager, represent the ninth generation to have farmed this piece of land. "From the late 1700s up until the early 1900s, it was just farming to survive," says Jim Coombs. "An orchard, chickens, cows, vegetables—it was all on this one place." In 1946, Jim's father George took over the farm and sold off all the livestock to pay off debts the farm and family had incurred during the Great Depression. In the '60s another farm was purchased and Jim came on with his father. Since then, potatoes have grown into the operation's bread and butter. Jim Coombs, LLC grows Atlantics, Superiors and Rebas for chipping companies Herr's and Wise Foods. A big portion of their potato crop also is sent to Campbell's Soup in North Carolina for use in its canned soups.