Kathleen Lagorio Janssen: For the Love of Farming

By Caitlin Hamer

Stockton’s location in the fertile lands of the Central Valley has always meant that the city’s legacy is entwined with agriculture. But it’s well known that this is an industry that is primarily populated by men. According to the USDA, in the U.S. alone, only 31 percent of farmers are women. But though their numbers are small, they’re still out there making just as much of a difference as men. Locally, one of those influential women is Kathleen Lagorio Janssen.

The farming gene runs deep in Kathleen. Her father, George Lagorio, was a farmer, as was his father before him. George founded Lagorio Farms in 1932, building the business into something of an empire, creating a lasting family legacy that’s still evident through thousands of acres and countless crops raised on those lands over the years. And while the family’s vast output is certainly significant, as the Lagorio family currently grows almonds, wine grapes, cherries and wheat, among other crops, Kathleen’s view of farming is both practical and sentimental.

“We lived out in the country, in the middle of an orchard,” she said, reflecting on her childhood. “When you grow up with it, you understand the long hours and what it takes to be a farmer. You watch the change of seasons and plant something and watch it grow and harvest it, and that’s very rewarding.”

The Lagorio family’s kitchen table served as George’s office, and Kathleen recalls eavesdropping on his business conversations from a young age. She helped her mother with the accounting, and once a year she’d try her hand at farm labor and grade the peaches, a process she described as “hot and itchy.” But although she wanted to dedicate her life to agriculture, it wasn’t exactly encouraged; while sons were likely to take over family farming businesses, daughters weren’t. Kathleen ended up obtaining a master’s degree from University of San Francisco and pursued the kind of career that was considered acceptable for women. “In those days, girls could be teachers or nurses, and I didn’t like blood, so I went into teaching,” she quipped.

She taught locally for nearly two decades, meeting her husband, Dean Janssen, during that time, and she served as president of the Stockton Teachers Association. But farming continued to call to her. George eventually invited Dean to work at Ace Tomato, the family’s Manteca-based tomato packing and shipping company, but Kathleen was also able to play a crucial role there by helping implement a computer system for the company. And in 1985, she launched Lagorio Communications. These two moves helped solidify her father’s faith in her abilities and helped her gain respect within the industry, and he began to pass more of the management roles to Kathleen and Dean.

When George passed in 1996, Kathleen became president and CEO of Lagorio Family Farms. By then, she was well versed in the day-to-day operations of the business. Today, her sons run the farming operations and manage the business, but Kathleen is still involved in the strategic planning and major decisions. And although the industry has changed in many ways, from the crops they grow to the number of women now working in agriculture, Kathleen loves the fact that at its core, the farming community remains largely the same.

“Most of the people that are involved in farming out here are still family-oriented,” she affirmed, noting that deals are sometimes still made through a simple handshake. “These are very salt-of-the-earth people.”

Kathleen also appreciates the fact that there are more ways for women to make inroads into agriculture now, with women working for seed companies and fertilizer companies and involved in other aspects of the industry in which you typically wouldn’t have seen a woman as recently as 20 years ago. And she very much appreciates the farmland region she’s called home her entire life, and not just for the sake of the fresh, healthy produce that’s grown here. She finds Stockton to be underrated, even by its own residents: “I wish everybody that lived here would be proud of it. It concerns me that we’re not boasting about all the good things we have here that other communities don’t,” she asserted.

In October 2022, Kathleen and Dean were honored with Goodwill’s 2022 Helping Hands Award, recognizing the pair’s dedication to serving the community. She’s following in her parents’ footsteps here, too, taking on the responsibility of generously sharing the abundance she was blessed with, tending to the local people as much as she does the land.

“Several years ago, it was pointed out to me that there’s a quote in Genesis that says God put man on earth to sow and care for the earth and that really struck me as a farmer,” she said. “That’s why I’m here. That’s my job: to care for the earth.”

For more information on Lagorio Family of Companies, visit www.lagorio.com.