< Back Steven Arms David and Jan Blittersdorf Frank Bryan Mary Cushman David Marvin Raymond J. McNulty Lindsey Melander Miriam E. Nelson Germain Njila David Perez Andrew Siebengartner Bridget Thabault John Todd Mary C. Watzin Jody Williams		DAVID MARVIN Class of 1970, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences “It takes 40 years for a stand of maple trees to reach productive size from seedlings,” says David Marvin, who owns and operates Butternut Mountain Farm, a thousand-acre sugar-maple woodlot and Christmas tree farm outside Johnson, Vermont. “So you really need to make a long-term commitment to a business like this.” The Marvin family’s commitment to UVM is even longer. David’s father was a botanist who founded the University’s Proctor Maple Research Center. David graduated with a B.S. in forestry in 1970 and chairs the CALS Board of Advisors. And his son, Ira, is in the CALS Class of 2005. In addition to harvesting its own crop, Butternut Mountain Farm packages, distributes, and markets throughout the world maple syrup from more than a hundred other producers in Vermont, Maine, and Quebec. “We know what we do from the tree to the table,” Marvin says. “That’s a Vermont value: Seeing the whole thing. In business it’s not just profit that’s important, it’s community.” Marvin notes that UVM contributes enormously to his community in northern Vermont—“Most of the staff at our little hospital were trained at UVM, and specialists come regularly from the College of Medicine and Fletcher Allen Health Care”--and to the entire region: “The productivity of the maple industry is four to five times greater than it used to be because of basic and applied research conducted at UVM.” “Whether it’s agriculture, health care, or conservation,” Marvin says, “there’s a real interconnectedness to everything we do. Vermont is a place where we try to make those connections more complete and celebrate them.”