For over 100 years, three generations of Goodalls have owned and worked to improve their land in Madison County, which now stands at 596 acres after enlarging the farm several times. Now, brothers Joe and Paul have fulfilled their parents’ final wishes to keep the land as a farm. In April, PEC used grants from the USDA’s Agricultural Land Easement program, the Virginia Land Conservation Foundation, and the Volgenau Foundation to purchase a conservation easement for $1.3 million, permanently protecting the farm for the next generation.
“My dad had a basic philosophy of ‘I don’t own my land. I am a steward of the land I’ve been given by God to look after during my lifetime, and I want to leave it better than I found it,’” Paul said. “We heard that many times and that’s certainly still a big motive for us.
“And my mom saw the farm [that she grew up on] get sold and become a subdivision with fairly large lots. So…she saw that place change, and she and Dad were hoping for that not to occur on the farm that they had worked together to acquire.”
After their parents’ passing, the brothers continued to improve the property their parents had loved so much. With financial and technical assistance from Friends of the Rappahannock, the Culpeper Soil and Water Conservation District, USDA, the Virginia Department of Forestry, and PEC, they created a forest stewardship plan, implemented rotational grazing, planted riparian buffers, and installed a well and livestock waterers. For their efforts, they received the Soil and Water Conservation District’s 2019 Forestry Award and Friends of the Rappahannock’s 2020 Clean Water Award.
Joe remembers driving his dad around the land long after his dad was no longer able to move about it and farm.
“He would say, ‘If you work the land all your life, you have an attachment to it. It’s almost like it’s a part of you and you kind of have that need to go see it every so often.’”
Seeing this connection with the natural world form from even the smallest of interactions — like when over 100 students, from middle school to college, came to the property to plant 3,765 trees with the PEC’s Headwater Stream Initiative — was one of the brothers’ favorite parts of this experience.
“We were thinking about how they would feel. Not only are we protecting the land, but we’re also introducing the next generation to what this is and why it’s important,” Paul said. “[The students] are the ones who are going to decide what our society does in regards to environmental protection and stewardship of the environment. So, we feel good about that…There were conversations about students wanting to come back in five years and see what it looked like because it’s not instant gratification. It’s a long-term view.”
Significantly adding to the protected lands in Madison County, the Goodall easement protects roughly 300 acres of woodland, 332 acres of prime agricultural soils and statewide significant soils, 4.51 miles of permanent vegetated streamside buffers and 6 acres of wetlands. “You’re doing it for the environment, for the world that we’re going to be leaving our children and grandchildren and our neighbors’ children and grandchildren,” Joe said. “The earth has been here a long, long time, and as Dad pointed out, we have a short period of time where we get to care for it. So to me, [an easement] just feels really good. And with how many people get their drinking water from the tributary of the Robinson River and the Rapidan, it’s a good neighbor thing to do.”
This article appeared in the 2025 Spring edition of The Piedmont Environmental Council’s member newsletter, The Piedmont View. If you’d like to become a PEC member or renew your membership, please visit pecva.org/join.