More than two decades ago, an idealistic group of citizens in midcoast Maine heard that one of the last farms in Wiscasset was about to be put on the chopping block. Owner Forrest Morris had died and the family was ready to sell.

“That was it,” remembers Seaver Leslie, one of the founders of the Morris Farm Trust, who had been watching farmland disappear around the region. “This farm represented an important part of Maine’s heritage and we were determined to save it. We wanted it to continue to benefit the community as a place where all kinds of people could come together and learn about farming and gardening and taking good care of the place they live.”

Now, 20 years later, the Morris Farm has weathered ups and downs but it is flourishing in exactly the way its founders imagined. Friends of the Morris Farm will gather there on Thursday, July 23, from 5 to 8 p.m. to enjoy music, food, and drink and celebrate not only the farm’s past but all that it is today and hopes to be going forward.

Children are enjoying Farm Camp, an outdoor summer day program for 4- to 11-year-olds. Master gardener volunteers are tending a demonstration garden, growing food for the Maine Harvest for Hunger. The Morris Farm Store is selling local food from this and other farms and producers: vegetables, meat, milk, and eggs as well as artisanal bread, fresh fish, maple syrup, and even local egg rolls. Farm Educator John Affleck is planning the next Backyard Farmer Series (including topics such as foraging for wild edibles, using heirloom seeds, and canning vegetables and fruits for the winter). Community members can “rent” plots for gardens if they don’t have space at home. The 16th annual Morris Farm Tour de Farms bicycle race, which takes riders to a series of organic farms and ends with a local foods feast, will take place on August 16. Two farmers are using the fields at the farm for pasturing their animals.

“Things are always happening here; it really is a hub where people can learn, work, have fun, and participate in the life of the community,” says Merry Fossel, co-president.

Fossel notes that the Morris Farm is focusing new attention on food security. The farm and the Chewonki Foundation, a Wiscasset neighbor, co-convened Lincoln County’s first forum on local food security in March.

“We are looking at ways that the Morris Farm can help address the hunger of citizens in the towns around us; it’s a natural extension of our interest in food, community, and stewardship,” says Fossel.

She has also started connecting fishermen to the Morris Farm Store by encouraging people to sign up for a share of fish, delivered weekly, following the community-supported agriculture, or “CSA,” model pioneered by farms.

Back in 1995, as citizens were working to raise the money to purchase the farm and turn it into a nonprofit, someone familiar with nonprofit organizations told Seaver Leslie, “If the Morris Farm can survive its first 20 years, it’s here for the long haul.” Says Leslie, “The Morris Farm is here to stay. This landscape and the work and fun happening here will always be part of Maine. That’s a victory.”