To get to the headquarters of the Cedar Grove Institute for Sustainable Communities, visitors have to navigate a lengthy dirt road past white picket fences, grazing horses and a variety of outbuildings in various stages of disrepair. Set in a one-room former Primitive Baptist church on a 43-acre spread in rural Orange County, N.C., the institute holds a collection of old, ergonomically incorrect wooden desks and metal filing cabinets. The only signs of modernity are computers atop the desks. Institute founders Allan Parnell and Ann Joyner, who live in a modest country house a stone's throw ... Read More
Inventing for Peanuts
November 4, 2008 • By • Leave a Comment
Surrounded by odd-looking contraptions in varying stages of assembly, his hands and clothes spotted by oil and grime and his thinning hair shooting skyward, undeterred by gravity, Jock Brandis looks every bit the mad scientist. After pouring a pound or two of unshelled peanuts into a cone-shaped concrete hopper, he climbs aboard a bicycle seat and puts his feet to work on pedals attached with belts to the hopper and a fan. As the hopper rotates, the shells are separated and blown aside by the fan, and peanuts fall through an opening at its base. "It's quite simple, really," he says. The ... Read More