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PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF ERIC AND YVONNE BOLTZ
In September 2015, the unthinkable happened to Eric and Yvonne Boltz. A negligent driver struck Eric, a material scientist and amateur competitive cyclist, while he was out for an after-work training ride, paralyzing him from the chest down.
By his estimations, the grieving process over his new disability took about two years and was accompanied by a host of frustrations, chief among them the challenge of making the family’s Madeira home accessible to his needs. “It was a three-level house and the only place to put an elevator would have been right in the middle of the living room,” Eric recalls.
The couple eventually decided to search for a property that they could adapt. In 2019, they settled on a piece of land in Loveland and started making plans to construct a large, accessible house along with a fully accessible apartment where the couple could host recently injured people learning to live with new challenges.
And then COVID-19 hit, bringing supply chain issues and soaring construction prices with it. “The builder came back with a quote that was three times our budget,” Eric recalls. “We kind of put everything on hold and instead we moved our son out here. I hired a buddy, a musician and a carpenter, and we started creating a farm here instead.”
Wait, a farm?
“When we bought the property, we were like, ‘We can have this really great garden now. It’s going to be cool—we’ll get some chickens!’” laughs Yvonne, farm manager for what would become Boltz to Nutz Farm. “Some of the farming emphasis came from our oldest. From the time I can remember, he had this dream of, ‘I’m going to run away and get a farm and live off the grid.’ We’ve fought to find our own solid ground, and if you want to provide solid ground for other people, you start with your family. Having that be Max’s dream, this made it all the more interesting.”
Today, the farm is full of life, with layer hens, a few testy roosters, sheep and fields of heirloom and specialty crops. And a key crop for the farming couple is hemp, which is started in the on-site greenhouse then transplanted to Boltz to Nutz fields.
“My husband’s injury left him with a lot of neuropathy, and we found that CBD and different cannabinoids really help with the neuropathy,” Yvonne says. “Opioids don’t help with that because, when you have a spinal cord injury, any signal that gets through to your brain that your brain doesn’t understand, the brain maps it to a pain center or a neuropathy center.”
“They deaden your brain, but that’s about it,” Eric adds.
“We thought, we’ve got this land,” Yvonne says. “I’m a chemist, Eric’s a material scientist. Let’s make a run at this and see if we can help people with these conditions find something that works for them.”
Setting up in “the shop,” the farm’s first-built structure, the Boltzes created a line of nutraceutical products that were not only peer-reviewed but used to great effect by Eric himself. This for-profit endeavor (along with on-farm eggs and produce sales) also allows the family to operate their nonprofit, Boltz Strong, which teaches people living with disabilities skills to be more independent from the shop’s fully accessible commercial kitchen.
“All the surfaces—including the sinks, the cupboards—move up and down so people can access them in a wheelchair,” Eric explains.
“The purpose of the kitchen right away was to share it. And when we started off with these classes, it kind of just exploded,” Eric says. “The goal of Boltz Strong is to build independence and community in the kitchen, but it goes beyond that to wanting to provide newly meaningful experiences outside the realm of what is normally accessible to the disabled.” The couple both emphasize that, in addition to gaining new skills, class participants are also developing a strong community where friendship and equality are top priorities.
The couple has limitless plans for Boltz Strong, including wheelchair-friendly pathways around the farm and even a fully accessible fishing setup by the pond. They’re currently planning to build a larger home on site, too, to offer their current home as the accessible visiting space they always envisioned.
Of course, all this will take time—and funds. In the short term, they have some ideas for fundraisers later this year, including a farm-to-table dinner prepared by Boltz Strong students and a concert weekend featuring their carpenter-musician friend, Steve DiLaudio. In addition, the nonprofit received a nearly $25,000 quality of life grant from the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation for adaptive farm and cooking classes in October.
In the long term, they see the nutraceuticals business, supplemented by on-farm crops, growing to sustain the nonprofit’s loftiest goals.
Anyone is welcome to come check out what the Boltz family is doing out in Loveland, so long as they follow one rule. “You have to be nice and kind,” Yvonne says. “Be who you are when you’re here.”
Boltz to Nuts Farm, 10718 Schlottman Rd., Loveland, boltz2nutz.com, (513) 486-4339, @boltz2nutzfarm on Instagram
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