September 10, 2020 at 1:36 p.m.
The man behind the corn stand
Tom Doyle has provided fresh corn to locals for over 40 years
The man behind the corn stand
By Stephanie Kuski-
His corn stand at East Point Centre on Lincoln Street is typically flooded with customers during the summer months, since it's prime time to snag the freshly-picked produce.
Doyle's sweet corn is picked the same morning he sells it and he encourages patrons to eat it the same day for optimal freshness.
Although Doyle's corn has been mainstay in the community for decades, his story starts a bit further from home.
"I was born and raised on a farm just outside of Waupaca in Portage County," Doyle began. "I was in 4H with this family and they were just neighbors down the road. They just had a little market at the time when I was growing up. Their son was a couple years younger than me, but we were in 4H together."
"So when he got out of college... He decided to go home to the farm and help," Doyle continued. "But when he came home, he went bigger and he planted more corn and went into wholesaling. By that time, I was teaching up here in Rhinelander, so I had my summers free and he knew that. So he suggested I get corn and have this as my summer job. So that's what I started to do."
Doyle was a teacher in the School District of Rhinelander for 36 years, having taught at Pine Lake School, James Williams Middle School and Central Elementary School. Since he had his summers free, he said he was able to sell corn through the summer until school started up again in the fall.
While this was a sweet summer gig when he was teaching, he said he continues selling corn to this day simply because he enjoys doing it.
"It's what I do in the summer," Doyle said humbly. "It keeps me going."
To say the least, The Corn Man definitely stays busy during the summer months.
"My alarm goes off at about quarter after two in the morning," he explained. "I try to get out of the house by 2:30. I go down and stop for gas at the truck stop in Merrill, go and get a little coffee... I get down to the farm outside Waupaca at about 10 to five... I get loaded usually by about 6 o'clock... Then I start back. I get back here by about 9 o'clock... Then I'm pretty much there until I sell out."
Doyle said the farm he gets his produce from is one of few farms that sell wholesale in this way.
The growing season in the Northwoods is much shorter compared to Portage County, he added, so by going further south he's able to offer corn earlier than most Northwoods farmers.
"There's not too many growers that do what this fella does," Doyle explained. "There's other people like me who are loading in the morning. There's a truck that goes to Minocqua, there's a truck that goes to Eagle River, Crandon, Three Lakes... That corn all comes out of Turners Farm Market in Waupaca."
"The earliest corn he has is started under plastic, and it's planted about the middle of April," he added. "He can get it in before most farmers can get corn in, because it's planted under plastic... He plants about 25, 30 acres like that. So he's got corn coming in usually about the middle of July."
Doyle said he sometimes has helpers who ride down to the farm with him to help him load his truck, and sometimes others help him sell the produce at his stand. He said his wife will help him set up his stand, and a young neighbor boy has been helping him make change and sell to customers at his stand.
"I've actually scaled down a lot from what I used to be," he added. "When my kids were small... I pulled the trailer and sold corn on Stevens Street, then I would go over on Lincoln Street where First Weber is now (it used to be the Pied Piper)... We did that for a number of years, then I just scaled back to just pulling the truck and having just one stand."
"Then I moved down the street to where I am now," he continued, referring to his current location in the parking lot of the East Point Centre. "It's my third year I've been where I'm at."
Over the years, Doyle said he's gotten to know his customers well and enjoys making conversation with them at his stand. He knows many of his patrons by name, asks them how they're doing and gives them advice on how to keep the produce fresh.
He said he has met a lot of interesting people through the years: just this summer, he said he met a man who brought his sweet corn all the way to Alaska to eat it with his son that very same evening.
"The people have made the job fun," Doyle said. "There's a lot of people who really appreciate fresh corn."
This year in particular has been extra busy, he noted.
On one particularly busy Saturday, Doyle said he sold about 300 dozen ears of corn and figures he had probably served about 400 customers that day alone.
"This year there's good sales," Doyle said. "I've been selling more this summer on that one stand than any year."
In addition to his mainstay of sweet corn, Doyle also offers a variety of garden produce as it becomes available through the summer, including melons, tomatoes, potatoes, zucchini, green beans, kohlrabi and onions.
Since last year, Doyle said he's also been bringing some of his sweet corn to the Rhinelander Area Food Pantry (RAFP).
This way, a local individual is supporting both a family farm and the local food pantry while also providing the freshest produce possible to his time-honored customers.
With all that has been going on in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic these past few months, it seems like it's the little things that mean a lot to members of our community, and Doyle's corn is one of those things that makes life - or at the very least, dinner - just a little sweeter.
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