Here’s the updated post with Bob’s corrections:
Volunteer Work Day This Saturday at Brovold Community Orchard
The Brovold Community Orchard invites everyone to its monthly Volunteer Work Day this Saturday, July 11, starting at 9:00 a.m. The apples are coming along nicely—and so are the weeds! Come lend a hand for a morning of tidying up the orchard so it looks its best for summer. At noon, volunteers will break for a great lunch shared among friends and neighbors. No experience needed—just show up ready to pitch in and enjoy the company.
About the Orchard
Tucked into a sunny, spring-fed hillside overlooking Cinderella Mountain at the east end of Alberton, the Brovold Community Orchard has been a gift to this community for more than 40 years. Norman Brovold planted the trees in the early 1980s with a simple conviction rooted in his Great Depression childhood: “I don’t want to see anybody go hungry.” He never sold his fruit—he gave it all away.
Today that legacy lives on. Jeanne (Brovold) and Bob Summerfield turned the orchard into a nonprofit in May 2021, and it now operates as a 501(c)(3) charitable corporation serving Mineral and Missoula counties. The orchard has about 85 trees—mostly apples, along with several pear trees, a few plums, and an apricot, plus some Concord grapes. Residents can obtain a permit to come and pick.
The orchard’s mission goes beyond fruit. It provides free fruit, education, outdoor recreation, and community events. In 2023, its best year so far, the orchard gave away 7,600 pounds of fruit to more than 500 people, from Clinton to St. Regis. The organization also partners with the Alberton School District on hands-on learning, from studying the apple tree life cycle to setting codling moth traps, teaching kids and adults alike where their food comes from and how to grow it themselves.
Whether you come to pull weeds, learn something new, or just share a meal with neighbors, you’ll be part of a tradition that has fed and connected this community for four decades. We hope to see you at 9 a.m. this Saturday!
For more information, visit brovoldorchard.org or find Brovold Orchard on Facebook. Photo credit: Jay Styles.