FARM AID: Credit Bob Dylan with planting the seed that surfaced as Farm Aid,
a 1985 benefit concert to support family farmers in the U.S. Months earlier, at
Live Aid, Dylan expressed the hope that the event's promoters could "... take a
little bit of [the money], maybe ... one ... moreor two million ... and use it, say, to
pay the mortgages on some of the farms ..." in his homeland. That September, in
Champaign, Ill., Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp and Neil Young headlined the first edition of the event. Nelson
and Mellencamp brought beleaguered family farmers to testify before Congress,
which subsequently passed the Agricultural Credit Act of 1987, intended to
shield family farms from foreclosure. Farm Aid is now an established advocacy
organization that produces its annual concerts in different cities to take the
issue directly to fans and farmers. Seen at the 2006 Farm Aid concert in Camden,
N.J., are current board members Young, Nelson, Mellencamp and Dave Matthews.
