The Mishnah tells us that “These are the things that have no measure: The portion of the field allocated to the poor, … acts of kindness, and the study of the Torah.” Two Gustavus Computer Science graduates, Travis and Nathan Dahlke (classes of 2000 and 2002) seem to have started with 1/3 acre as the initial measure for Hands for Harvest, a non-profit using volunteer labor to grow food for food banks. But surely it will expand. Gail Rosenblum tells the story in this week’s Star Tribune.
Update 2009-09-27: The Free Press has now reported on this story as well. They also give the same one acre figure as the Star Tribune did, as opposed to my 1/3 acre. I had gotten the smaller figure from a photo caption on the Hands for Harvest web site. But that caption referred to how much was planted the first day, as opposed to the first season. So depending on how you read “started with,” I was wrong. Or said another way, the expansion I predicted has already started.