Cheetah Haysom

Born in South Africa, I came to the US in 1975 to be an overseas correspondent for a group of South African newspapers and have been here, working as a writer, ever since. I moved to this beautiful part of the Hudson Valley called the Black Dirt Region more than 20 years ago. I am now writing a book about this extraordinary place, the lake of rare, rich soil, that makes it so remarkable, the people who settled here and their descedants who still farm here, though it's a life with many obstacles. This picture is my view over Black Dirt farmland, looking south in the fall.