Meet Ohio farmer Jane Marshall, the Preble County problem solver

The sound of metal dragging on pavement rose above the traffic noise on a sunny afternoon. Everyone in downtown Eaton, Ohio, continued about their business as a flatbed semi searched for a place to pull over and retrieve its rogue ratchet strap clinking down the street. Except Jane Marshall.

Before the driver could get out, the broad-shouldered, silver-haired woman pulled the strap out of the road and began winding it up. Within minutes, the semi was on its way.

To a truck driver passing through an unfamiliar town, the kind gesture may have been stunning, unexpected at least. However, to locals there's nothing surprising about "Citizen Jane" helping a stranger.

For Jane, it was just Wednesday.

"She has the heart of a servant," says farmer and Preble County Commissioner Rachael Vonderhaar.

Home From the Start

Jane was raised the oldest of four kids on her family's 200-acre farm in Preble County, Ohio.

"I was the one who took care of everything when Dad was gone," she explains. "I don't remember not driving a tractor." By second grade, she knew how to drive a standard-transmission pickup.

When her father, Jack Armstead, wasn't in town working for the highway department, Jane spent hours farming with him.

"There are people who just get everything done. You don't even know how they do what they do. That was my dad. Problem-solving was the order of the day, and you used what you had," she says, recalling her dad using old license plates to hold together hog houses.

She believed she could, so she did

No one in her family had been to college. But in 1981, she moved from rural Preble County to Columbus to study agriculture engineering at The Ohio State University.

Just 100 miles from home, she experienced culture shock as one of a handful of women in her major. "At home, I never heard, 'Girls can't do this,' or 'Jane can't do that.'" She was used to driving all sorts of equipment and loading her own feed at the feed mill. "I always did whatever the guys did," she says.

Farming had shown Jane the value of teamwork from an early age. Life wasn't divided by boys' jobs or girls' jobs. "I think you better go wherever you're needed to do the work that is at hand, whatever that is. That's how I grew up," Jane says.

After graduating and returning to Preble County, she was introduced to her life's most important teammate. A few weeks after meeting on the way to a farm show, Thomas Marshall invited her for a combine ride at his family's dairy.

In December 1987, the couple was engaged. They married in March 1988.

By then, Jane had been promoted from youth leader to caseworker serving the families of neglected, abused, and troubled children at the Preble County Children's Home. It was challenging work. Jane credits her years with the children's home for helping her learn to problem-solve with people.

"You had to be creative," she says. "You have to be creative in life. You can't just let things happen. How do we fix it? How do we make it better?"

Mom at Meetings

In 1990, when the Marshalls' oldest daughter, Caitlin, was born, Jane resigned from the children's home to be a farm wife and mother full-time. Their second daughter, Mariah, was born the next year. Despite her new role, there wasn't much stay-at-home about Jane's approach to motherhood.

Efforts to build homes around the Marshalls' farm, 10 minutes outside of Eaton, and also near the farm where Jane grew up, on the other side of the county, caught her attention. "They were trying to put subdivisions on little township roads where there's no sewer, there's no water, there's nothing," Jane recalls.

Encouraging a large number of people to live at a distance from emergency services, schools, and other community institutions was a poor use of resources, Jane believed. She got involved, filling her calendar with meetings to understand what other people were thinking.

Ultimately, the developments were stopped. In the process, Jane and others worked to establish lasting change preserving farmland and stewarding shared services.

Don't Trash Our County

More challenges faced Preble County residents in the 1990s. Neighboring Montgomery County, which includes the city of Dayton, was considering multiple sites along the Preble County border for a new landfill.

The Marshalls didn't own any property on the county line, but the proposal didn't sit well with Jane. "Be a good neighbor and put the landfill in the middle of your property. Don't put it right on our border," she says.

Jane's friends, a young newlywed couple, lived in the middle of one of the proposed sites. "They didn't even know what to do. 'Do we build a barn knowing we might lose it? Do we
improve our house?'" Jane was frustrated for them. "Then, I started thinking about it from a Preble County standpoint."

The problem was clear, but she wasn't an expert on landfills, county government, or zoning issues. "My theory is, if you don't know what to do, put more heads together," says Jane.

She called a meeting. "Even on your best day, you can't do this kind of stuff by yourself," Jane says. At the meeting, Preble CARES was born. Jane was elected president. A local man stepped up to be treasurer. They needed a secretary.

"This little lady, Liz King Jones, stood up, 'I'll do it!' I didn't know her from Adam. They'd just moved to the county line and two of the sites were just across from their house," Jane says.

The two hit it off. This was the first of many projects Jane and Liz would tackle over the years. "I've never really thought about how you find friends. Do stuff! Be involved in the community. If you don't find friends, there's probably something wrong," Jane says with a laugh.

Aside from being a proud Preble County resident, Jane didn't have skin in the game, but she took her role seriously. "It was probably three nights a week of meetings, if not four," she recalls.

While Thomas and Jane were at the hospital for the birth of their third daughter, McKenna, Liz called the hospital with the news: Montgomery County decided not to site a landfill near the county line.

Growing Family and Résumé

As the kids grew, they attended meetings and watched their mother write letters and raise money for causes that mattered to Preble County. Family milestones are intertwined with community service.

There was the campaign to prevent year-round school when Mariah became school age. Through her pregnancy with Mathias, Jane served on the fair board. JP completed the family in 2001 and went to many Farm Bureau and Preble County Mental Health board meetings as an infant.

The Marshalls' home was bustling with five children, but Jane found room in her heart and time in her schedule to care for more as a court-appointed special advocate (CASA) in the juvenile court system.

"CASAs act as the eyes and ears of the juvenile court judge and meet with all people involved in the case — kids, parents, foster parents, caseworkers — and recommend to the judge what is in the kids' best interest," explains Mary.

Mary, a former director of the program, notes Jane is one of the county's longest-serving volunteers. Youth have benefited from her plainspoken approach and dedication to finding the best answer for each child.

Rachael adds, "She's always been an advocate for others. Advocating to help someone improve their life, speak up for themselves, or get the educational pieces they need."

Landfill Expert

By 2002, Jane had developed a reputation as a problem solver. She'd learned about zoning and public records. One day she got a call from a concerned local. The county landfill was considering a lease to a large waste company.

"The premise was that they'd fill our existing landfill and then expand to the south. They weren't going to buy it. The company would lease it, and Preble County would be responsible for the cleanup and any long-term issues," Jane says.

The hair on the back of her neck stood up at the thought of what this could mean for the county in the future. Despite her regular presence at Preble County Commissioners meetings, this phone call was the first Jane had heard about the lease. Her phone kept ringing so, she organized a meeting.

A crowd gathered at the fairgrounds. "It was a full house. People were up in arms," Jane recalls. After the meeting, as she stood around talking, "People would come up to me, pick up my thumb, and put money under it. I've never seen anything like this before." It was like a scene from It's a Wonderful Life.

"It's that can-do attitude that she has shared with me and our community that makes the impossible seem possible," says Rachael. "She's always thinking about how puzzle pieces fit together."

As president, Jane united a diverse group of people to take action. "We had people that had never worked together working on this. People that were pretty much, on most issues, diametrically opposed, but they all came to the same place to work on the same problem," she says.

No Title Necessary

Some of Jane's contributions to the community come with a title: president of Ohio Agri-Women, Habitat for Humanity treasurer and chair, county commissioner, Bible study leader, congregation song leader. However, many of her roles can't be summarized simply.

She has made an untold number of quilts for people facing illness or suffering loss. Help comes from her wide circle of skilled sewing friends, but there's always room for more hands. "We always need someone to iron!" Liz says with a smile. Joining Jane for a quilting project is guaranteed to come with "meaty conversation" and hearty laughs, Rachael says.

Your Phone-a-Friend

"What I've always found interesting are the number of people in our community that call and ask her for help. She's not looking for a thank-you. She's always willing to help when they call," Rachael adds.

One day it may be a farmer who has questions about a permitting issue. The next day it's a request for her famous pretzels at a local event or help memorializing a loved one with a quilt. Maybe it's a friend who needs a listening ear.