Bishop's Orchards Family Fund

Bishop’s Orchards is woven into the very fabric of the Guilford community and the towns and cities that spread out beyond its 313 acres of farmland. The farm has been part of the town since 1871, when Keith Bishop’s great-great-grandfather, Walter Goodrich Bishop, sold vegetables, fruits and ice to families along the shoreline. Bishop’s first orchard began in 1909.  

Six generations of Bishops have run the farm, which now has 100 year-round employees, and 180 during harvest time. “Throughout that time, we’ve continually evolved and worked to be good stewards of the land,” Keith Bishop said. 

Today, Bishop’s Orchards products are primarily sold directly to consumers, with some to farm markets in CT, has a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program, a winery and a robust pick-your-own business in its orchards. 

People come from all over to visit the corn maze and pick pumpkins in the fall, to see the llamas, alpacas and goats at the farm, and pick up ready-made dinner items or a fresh baked apple pie. 

From their earliest days in Guilford, giving back has been a central tenet of the Bishop family. “The people of Guilford and the larger community have supported our family’s farm for more than 150 years,” said Bishop. “We feel it’s very important to support the people of our communities and the nonprofits that do so much work here. My parents were very involved and now our children are. It’s a continuous loop.”  

Keith Bishop recently retired from the farm’s daily operations and remains its board chair and president while his daughters, Sarah Bishop Dellaventura and Carrie Bishop Healy, are co-CEO’s and their son, Ryan Warsaw-Fan Bishop, is the farm production foreman. 

Giving is part of the daily hum of the farm market. Customers can choose to round up their purchases to provide funds to about a dozen different local charities supported by the Bishop’s, which raises $5,000 to $6,000 each month. Keith’s wife, Debbie Bishop, has been involved in the work of the Susan G. Komen breast cancer foundation for many years and Keith has served on numerous local boards and commissions. 

Now, Keith, Debbie and their family have established the Bishop’s Orchard Family Fund at The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven to provide funds in perpetuity to organizations that they have long supported. This includes the SARAH Foundation of Guilford, which serves hundreds of individuals with intellectual and other challenges, providing day programs, recreation and leisure activities as well as SARAH Tuxis which provides housing support. 

“My oldest sister passed away 14 years ago, and she had Down Syndrome,” Debbie Bishop said. “The SARAH organization and other programs made her life so much richer than doctors said it would be early on.”

Keith and Debbie Bishop are also legal guardians of a former employee, an older man who has an autism spectrum disorder. “He worked for us for more than 20 years and had to retire five years ago because of a health condition,” Bishop said. “After his parents passed away, he had no living relatives, so my wife and I became his guardians. We want to support SARAH Tuxis, the organization that makes his home possible and to support the recreational programs that he enjoys so much.” 

Their fund will also support Apple Pi Robotics. “My father enjoyed that one of his grandsons in New Hampshire was participating in a robotics program and he said `we need to bring that to Guilford,’” Bishop said. He did in 2006 and today more than 400 high school students from Guilford and surrounding towns have participated in the program.

“It opens the eyes of kids about robotics and engineering, and it emphasizes teamwork and collaboration,” Bishop added. 

Bishop said he and his family are excited to think about all the ways the fund will impact people, and they envision that it will eventually support “over a half dozen organizations.” 

They chose to create it at The Community Foundation “because many of our family members and employees have been involved in The Community Foundation and we want to give close to home, to help our neighbors. Our family has had deep connections to the people here. Our children will carry that forward through this fund.”