Did you know Luke Skywalker worked on a farm?
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far way, Luke Skywalker worked on a farm.
In recognition of Star Wars Day (May the 4th be with you), Farms.com scoured the galaxy to find multiple intersections between agriculture and the storied film franchise.
Before fighting Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker worked on his uncle Owen Lars’s moisture farm – an area of land used to produce water by drawing moisture from the dry air.
“Two generations of the Lars family sought to make a living on this hardscrabble moisture farm on Tatooine, contending not just with the planet’s hot and arid conditions but also the vicious bands of Tusken Raiders,” the Star Wars website says.
The farm used 63 vaporators to harvest excess humidity for the atmosphere.
On the farm, Skywalker’s duties included helping keep two droids – CP30 and R2D2, up and running.
He also helped at harvest.
“Harvest is when I need you the most,” Lars said to Skywalker in A New Hope, after Luke expressed his interest to leave the farm to join the Imperial Academy, a military school. “Only one more season. This year we’ll make enough on the harvest, so I’ll be able to hire some more hands.”
Lars Owen mentions harvest around the 1:20 mark of the video.
Within Star Wars lore, multiple Agriworlds exist.
These are planets whose entire industrial capacity was dedicated to agriculture.
Ukio, for example, is considered “one of the best-known and most efficient agricultural planets in its sector,” a fan site says.
Its growing season lasted most of the year and resulted in harvests of grain and other foods.
Planet Ukio.
Most of the land was dedicated to food production, “but still contained ample fallow land for future expansion of the industry.”
Ukian farmland “was carefully cultivated and painstakingly maintained for maximum output, and crop rotation was required by law to prevent the destruction of arable land.”
Sorgan, another Agriworld, is described as a “green world dotted by ramshackle villages where farmers spend their days fishing for krill in the wetlands, the sound of their children playing in the air,” the Star Wars site says.
And farmers and ranchers settled the planet of Lothal.
“As Lothal became established as a sustainable ecosystem for farming, more and more immigrants trained as technicians and laborers flocked to the planet to support the needs of the farming community,” a fan site says.
The planet would eventually find itself under Imperial occupation, with farmers being kicked off of their land to make way for weapons factories.
Lando Calrissian and Morad Sumar were among the notable farm owners on Lothal.
And within the Jedi Order existed the AgriCorps.
This organization was made up of Jedi initiates who failed to pass their trials. These individuals were tasked with using their connection to the Force for the betterment of galactic society.
These duties included providing “healthy crops to those under-privileged star systems suffering from natural disasters or blight…,” a fan site says.