The Fairview Flyer: 2026 season closeout

 

It’s been a great tomato season… there are no two ways about it! With 86 tomatoes over 11 producing plants, the numbers have been strong across the board, and for the first real season of propagating the “new hybrid heirloom” (“The Fairview Flyer”), 

a great season for the new variety!  I raised from seed and planted 12 plants across the three varietals: 6 "Fairview Flyers", 3 Mrs. Carfang’s “Big Pinks”, and 3 MaMa’s “old yellow” tomatoes.  One of the “Fairview Flyer “plants did not grow very well and produced no blossoms or fruit… thus 11 producing plants this season.

 

A few key “notable notes:”

Ø  I harvested well over 40 Fairview Flyer tomatoes, with one (pictured at the left of this picture below) that weighed in a 1¾ pounds… clearly the largest tomato I have ever grown. While huge in my book, my nephew Mike grew one “Fairview Flyer" plant this year in Virginia which produced well, with one fruit over 2 pounds!

 

Ø  The Fairview Flyer plants were very tall, well over 14 ft. tall by the end of the season, and a few had taproots that were over 2 ft. long.

 

Ø  All three varieties produced well, with the “Big Pinks” producing some really tasty fruit… still my favorite flavor I think!!

 

Ø  The “Fairview Flyer” had characteristics of both “parent” plants… producing plentiful reddish fruit with orange shoulders (pictured top right) , even taller plants than the “Big Pinks”, and had blight resistance that was good but not quite as strong as “Mama’s old yellows.” 

 

A great season all around and nothing beats going out to the garden, early on a summer morning, colander in hand, picking a good batch of all three types of tomatoes for great meals ahead.  As is our custom, I have saved seeds from great mid-season fruits, and the seeds are being stored in a dark spot, awaiting my seed starting work in mid-January!  Now for the fall/winter soil work and more reading about how to better manage the ground-based blight that ultimately brought my season to an end!  

I hope you all had a great Tomato season as well!!

A "Fairview Flyer" Update

 

Some of you will remember from last fall, when I posted the story of the "Fairview Flyer," the new tomato varietal that I discovered/created in 2025 ( you can read that post below!)  While the results last year were remarkable, I had no idea what to expect for this season.  I kept seeds from three distinct tomatoes, and marked them accordingly.  After storing them in a dry dark place over the winter, I pulled the seeds out and proceeded to utilize my normal "seed starting" techniques. I used the "Fairview Flyer" seeds from one single tomato batch, and they germinated very well, and produced strong seedlings.  In early April, after the last frost, I planted 6 seedlings into the garden, flanked by 3 of MaMa's Yellow Tomatoes, and 3 of the "Carfang Big Pinks."  

Here we are in early June, and all 12 plants are flourishing, and 11 out of the 12 have put on fruit and are covered with blossoms.  Additionally as you can see from a recent picture to the right, the "Fairview Flyers" ( in the middle) are almost 7 feet tall and the "Carfang Big Pinks" ( on the right) are above 6 feet tall ( the bamboo poles I just put in are 10 ft tall!)  One oddity has presented itself... one of the "Fairview Flyer" is really small ( about 4 1/2 feet tall) and has produced no fruit or blossoms as of June 1.  It looks exactly like the MaMa Tomatoes which are all 52-54 inches tall, exactly the same plant and leaf color and shape... yet no blossoms and no fruit... fascinating!

Well the adventure in the garden continues, and later in the season I will post some pictures of the fruit coming off all three tomato varieties... and we'll see if my little "runt" "Fairview Flyer" produces anything at all.  When they say that every season is a new unique experience in the garden and in the fields of agriculture, I am living that truth deeply this season with the adventures of the "Fairview Flyer!"

Sunday, November 2, 2025

The story of the "Fairview Flyer"

 I started posting essays on this platform over 16 years ago... and from the beginning I wanted to share    lessons of leadership and life. stories, insights and experiences  (literally on the masthead of my blog) that might be insightful to the reader.  Here we are today with this essay being the 297th posted on the blog,  and with well over 225,000 page views to date I have been surprised and humbled by the breadth and impact of my "stories."  Today's essay is focused on a simple tomato, and the pure exhilaration that has emerged through this past gardening season!

For decades, I have been growing two varieties of heirloom tomatoes that have been passed to my by family and friends.  One I have written about that comes down from my grandmother that is a yellow tomato variety, on relatively short plants,  with very sweet somewhat small fruit that she grew for many years/decades, possibly from before I was born.  The second variety was passed along from my friend Dave Carfang's family, who were given this tomato ( "The Carfang Big Pinks) in the early 70's.  It grows on very long tomato vines, and produce large beautiful pink tomatoes, some as large (or larger) as 1 pound. Here is a picture of those two varieties from this past season.  I always knew that heirloom tomatoes were "open pollinators" meaning that they could possibly "cross pollinate" with other nearby tomatoes but over the years/decades I never had that "problem."

Well here we come to the spring of 2025, with tomato seedlings in the garden growing well and I notice an unusual phenomenon.  I had 14 seedlings in the garden that I raised from seeds from last year, seven of Mama's yellow tomatoes and what I THOUGHT were seven of the "Big Pinks."  Well to my amazement, one go the big pinks looks different from the others and ALL of them were from the seeds of one or two tomatoes from 2024.  Mama's tomatoes have serrated ( jagged) leaves and the "Big Pinks" have smooth leaves and lo and behold one of the "Big Pink" seedlings had serrated leaves.  I wrote about this dynamic back in May, you can see that essay here, https://fylegacy.blogspot.com/2025/05/innovation-can-come-from-some.html

The reality hit me mid-summer as the plants reached maturity and started putting off fruit.  Mama's tomato plants grew to about 5ft or so and stopped.  The "Big Pinks" grew to about 8-9 ft and stopped but this new "heirloom hybrid" just kept on growing.  As it put on fruit, I realized that the tomatoes were different and unique... larger than Mama's, smaller than the "Big Pinks" and had a touch of yellow/orange on the shoulders.. pictures below!

Well to say the least I was excited and amazed, the plant kept on growing and it prolifically put on fruit. I pulled the tomato plant/vine out of the garden this week and it was over 13 ft long.

 I took one of the best tomatoes it produced this summer and let it "over-ripen" on the vine and used it as my source for seeds.  I am so eager to get to late January when I start my tomato seeds and see if they are fertile and if I can propagate this new variety... which I have named "The Fairview Flyer."  

My focus in the essays that I have posted across all these years has been on the idea of "finding your legacy," the concept that if we can act intentionally in our families, our communities, our companies and our country we can leave all of those environments in a better place than when we found them.  I never thought that this concept might include creating a "new" tomato variety that I can pass along to generations of gardeners that may follow me... maybe someday marveling at the "Fairview Flyer" years/decades after I have passed, wondering about its humble origins as they enjoy the delicious tomatoes, or bemused but the amazing length of the vines at the end of the season.  I promise to add a postscript to this essay early next year once the seedlings get going!!