Fresh Valley Farms is built on more than good soil. It is built on people, continuity, and a century of one family caring for the same land in Spallumcheen, just outside Armstrong, British Columbia.
The beginning: Bill & Leo Meggait (1923)
The Meggait family’s connection to the farmland on Mountain View Road began in October 1923, when William (Bill) and Leonore (Leo) Meggait purchased the original farm property at 1152 Mountain View Road. The parcel consisted of 154 acres, purchased for $6,000, and became the foundation of what is now Fresh Valley Farms.
At the time, Armstrong was a deeply agricultural community. Dairy, livestock, and hay production shaped everyday life. Farm families were central to both the local economy and community institutions, including churches, schools, and cooperatives.
That first Meggait farmstead established a permanent family presence on Mountain View Road. It also marked the beginning of uninterrupted family farming on this land, a distinction that now spans more than one hundred years.
The second generation: Martin & Gerry Meggait
Martin Meggait, Bill and Leo’s son, was born in 1927 at 1152 Mountain View Rd. He grew up on the farm during a time when agriculture relied heavily on horses, manual labor, and seasonal rhythms.
Martin attended the then brand new brick school (AES) in Armstrong, where he was on the day his home burned down from a chimney fire in 1937. A new farmhouse was rebuilt in exactly the same location and he lived in the new house with his family. He left school early to go to work full time on the Meggait farm and homestead, though his working life had included farm chores before and after school long before that.
In the early 1970s, Martin inherited the farm from his elderly mother. He and his wife, Geraldine (Gerry) Meggait, moved back to the property with their youngest son, who was still in high school. Together, they continued to farm the land, maintaining livestock, hay fields, and the day-to-day work required to farm.
The third generation: Tony & Robin Meggait
In 1981, Martin and Gerry’s middle son, Tony Meggait, returned to farm with Martin. Tony and his wife Robin raised their family on the land, continuing the tradition of multi-generational living and working on the same property.
Tony’s son, Steve Meggait, grew up immersed in farm life. Like many children raised on farms, Steve spent time away as a young adult, working a variety of jobs in Vancouver and the Kootenays.
The fourth generation: Steve Meggait and Annelise Grube-Cavers
In 2012, Steve Meggait returned home to farm full time with Tony. Alongside his partner Annelise Grube-Cavers, he began shaping the modern incarnation of the farm, now known as Fresh Valley Farms. Annelise also came from a farming family, and is a third-generation farmer herself.
Together, Steve and Annelise expanded and diversified the operation while staying rooted in the family’s long-standing values. They graze cattle and market beef directly to customers throughout the North and Central Okanagan. They also raise free-range chicken, laying hens, and pastured pork, creating a diversified, direct-to-consumer farm rooted in regenerative agriculture.
Their work reflects both continuity and adaptation. While the land and family remain the same, farming methods, markets, and relationships with customers have evolved.
The fifth generation
Steve and Annelise’s two young children are now the fifth generation of the Meggait family to spend much of their time on this land. They are already growing up alongside grazing cattle, laying hens, and farm chores, just as earlier generations did.
The land today
The farm has grown beyond its original boundaries while remaining centered on Mountain View Road. The original parcel at 1152 Mountain View Road remains an active part of the farm. Over time, the family added a second parcel at 1346 Mountain View Road, which now houses the farm office and serves as a central operations hub. Fresh Valley Farms also leases neighbouring land at 1476 Mountain View Road, including fields and a guesthouse for farm stays.
Multiple generations of the family still live on the land today. Tony and Robin Meggait, along with Gerry Meggait, who turned 98 in 2025, reside at the original parcel. Steve, Annelise, and their children live about one kilometer down the road on the second parcel. The family continues to farm cooperatively, sharing land, labour, equipment, and responsibility.
Carrying the farm forward
Fresh Valley Farms is a living, working farm shaped by each generation that has come before.
From Bill & Leo Meggait’s original purchase in 1923, to Martin & Gerry’s stewardship, to Tony & Robin’s early organic agriculture, and now to Steve and Annelise’s leadership, the farm has remained anchored to the same place while adapting to new realities.
More than a century later, cattle still graze the same fields, hay is still cut from the same ground, and the family continues to care for this land with the understanding that they are stewards in a much longer story.