From the Peace Corps to Christmas Tree Farming, Elaine Seymour Does it All

Rudolph the brown-nosed dog will greet you as you open the door to the office and gift shop at Seymour Christmas Tree Farm in Crainville, but the lady unimposing lady behind the counter is the person with the answers.

Elaine Seymour is the unsung hero of the tree farm, just ask her husband Frank. He'll be the first to tell you that she is the backbone of the farm and keeps it going. Just don't expect her to do it for much longer...less than a month, in fact.

This is the last season for the tree farm. When Christmas is done, Frank and Elaine will be returning to the lifestyle that first brought them to Southern Illinois and that means no time for the 50-acre farm.

"We started ending it last year, by finding homes for the animals in the petting zoo," Elaine said. "The zoo had featured everything from pygmy goats and pot-bellied pigs to a donkey and a camel, she said, but last year, they decided it was time to let it go.

"We knew when we moved here that development was coming, but it happened a lot faster than we imagined," she said. So when they decided to return to their plans and roots, they decided to impact the housing boom the best way they could.

"We decided that we could subdivide the farm or we could let someone else do it," she said. "If we do it, we get to add that money to our retirement fund and impact how it's done."

So the lots closest to Samuel Road are one-acre lots, large enough for a nice family home and some space. The lots further back are five-acre lots, designed to allow people to keep the country feel of the neighborhood.

And, the Seymours? Well, they have spent their lives traveling and Southern Illinois was always intended to be a stop along the way.

"This was supposed to be part of the triangle tour," Elaine said as she recounted the numerous countries she and Frank have visited over the years. The "triangle tour" was supposed to include their old home in Alaska, Elaine's native California and Southern Illinois, where Frank is a Herrin native.

"The plan was that we would travel between the tree places and we had a big fifth wheel travel trailer, but that got old," she said.