In the year 2001 Meredith and Jeremy Compton took over Peaceful Valley Orchards. Prior to Meredith and Jeremy stepping in, the farm was not active. Jeremy worked hard all winter to get the fruit trees back into production. In the spring the ground was worked and vegetables were planted.

In July 2001 Peaceful Valley Orchards had its grand re-opening just in time for peach season. At that time their farm market was only a tent. In the fall of 2001 Peaceful Valley Orchards invited the public into their orchard for the first time to pick their own apples. When Meredith and Jeremy opened for the 2002 growing season, they introduced their customers to their new farm market. They also added pick-your-own pumpkins in addition to the apples.

Jeremy was born in Flemington, NJ and raised there until the age of 7 when his family decided to give dairy farming in Wisconsin a try. After 7 years of dairy farming, the Compton’s missed their family in NJ and decided to move back to Flemington. At the age of 17 Jeremy started working at the Rutgers Snyder Research farm part time. After he graduated high school he continued to work at the research farm full time. Jeremy was in charge of maintaining all the tree fruit research at the farm. In addition to collecting and analyzing all the data, it was his responsibility to plant, prune and train all the tree fruit. Another one his duties was to help train and educate other commercial NJ farmers about different tree fruit techniques and methods. In January 2003, after 10 years of service, Jeremy decided it was time to leave the research farm and dedicate his full attention to Peaceful Valley Orchards.

Meredith was born and raised in Neshanic, NJ. Like Jeremy, there was never any doubt agriculture would be in her future. She always knew she would attend her father’s Alma matar, Delaware Valley College of Science and Agriculture in Doylestown, PA. She became interested in tree fruit production when she started working at the Rutgers Snyder Research farm in the summer during her college years. This is also where Jeremy and Meredith first met. After college, Meredith moved to south Jersey where she worked as the assistant to the tree fruit entomologist at the Rutgers Research farm in Bridgeton, NJ. After being in the south for a year and a half, she missed her family and friends and decided to take another position within Rutgers University. In February 2006, Meredith left her position at Rutgers to farm full time.

In the spring of 2005, the couple took over another farm in Pittstown. The additional land allowed the couple to branch out into new crops and put in a corn maze. This farm is now the sole location of Peaceful Valley Orchards, complete with a commercial kitchen and much more space to display Jersey Fresh produce.

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