Dear Friends,

I don’t know exactly when I started reading Front Porch Republic or how I found it. I’m sure it had something to do with loving Wendell Berry and looking for others who shared that sensibility. I wrote my first essay for the site back in 2020. I kept writing, kept reading, started meeting other “Porchers,” and now I help out as an editor and a board member.

To my own surprise, I recently volunteered to do FPR’s “donor relations.” I’m not a money guy. I like ideas; money-talk always makes me feel a little uncomfortable. Typical professor with his head in the clouds. But some part of me has always known that’s unwise, and that if I really cared about ideas, I’d care about how they get paid for. After all, lots of things go into the making and sharing of ideas besides “thinking,” and those things cost money.

FPR has always been a labor of love with a shoestring budget. Writers don’t get paid, and staff are volunteers. Most of our money comes from the monthly donations of a small group of dedicated supporters. I think we’ve made good use of it, mainly to pay for the website and the annual conferences. But we’re getting to the point where we can start doing more of the work we’re here to do, if we can find the support.

We have around forty people who give $3 a month. Along with a handful of others who’ve given some larger occasional gifts, these forty people have kept FPR’s lights on. If forty others joined that three-dollar-a-month club, and if the forty who currently give $3 decided to start giving $6, it would—well, I was about to say “revolutionize,” but revolution isn’t really the FPR vibe, is it? We don’t want to revolutionize anything. We don’t want to “move fast and break things.” We want to make it possible to do more of what we’re already doing, to do it even better, and to support the people who are doing it.

So if you can afford it, consider giving, or giving a bit more this year.

Thank you,

Adam Smith