How'd it start?

In 2007 we purchased a farm here in Southwest Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains of Appalachia.  The paternal side of my family have roots here going back to the 1600's.  More on that below, but anywhoo, We lived in a fancy shed with only rain water and solar panels with tractor batteries for power for a year while building our home... And we loved it!  Since then we've learned as much as possible about homesteading and living off the land.  We love foraging for everything from berries to mushrooms and have figured out how to use basically everything that we used to throw away from peelings of fruit to table scraps and napkins.  It's been an adventure for us the whole way.

We began to think about growing hemp in 2017 when our state started a program with Virginia Tech. We also began using CBD and quickly realized it was very beneficial to us personally.  We often say it was a "game changer" for us.  We no longer needed any aspirin or ibuprofen.  We both have metal in us from various car crashes, etc so our pain was real and so was the relief.  As soon as the farm bill passed in 2018 we began plotting our first season growing hemp and quickly applied for our growers and processors license, and here we are today. 

What's in a name?  The Qberry Story

People ask "What's a Qberry?"  Well, our last name is Quesenberry and it's been common over many years for it to be shortened to Qberry as sort of a nickname.  

It is a name you've probably never heard if you aren't from somewhere near the Appalachian Mountains.  The name originated in the village of Questenberg, Germany in the 13th century. Castle Von Questenberg's ruins are still visible in a village called Questenberg which is part of the Südharz municipality.

 

* In 1624, a single Questenbury youth made his way onto a ship set for the British colony of Virginia. At the young age of 16, Thomas Questenbury landed in colonial Virginia, where he married and became the patriarch of us all. He is the only known Questenbury ancestor to have come to America, and was among the earliest pioneers of our country. All American variations of the name can trace their lineage back through him. Such American spellings include: Quesenberry, Quisenberry, Christenberry, Quesinberry, Crusenberry, Quessenberry, and Quesenbury, to name a few. There are rumors that the English Questenbury branch became extinct in 1701. The Cologne and Austrian Questenberg branches are also both rumored to have became extinct in 1794, with the latter ending with the death of Count Johann Anthon von Questenberg, Councilor of War to the Emperor of Austria. It is believed that the American branch alone survives today!

*http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burg_Questenberg

(Translated from German by Jared Quesenberry)

So you can see we are pretty proud of our name and heritage and wanted to reflect that in the name of our farm.