![]() ![]() On the same country road was a 23-acre property with a 50,000-square-foot warehouse, barns, and a large home. The goal was to find more land and buildings for growing. It did not take long for Mushroom Mountain to flourish. “I knew I could grow mushrooms on a large scale.” “I just wanted to get to work on it so badly,” says Tradd, who explains that he had tried a mushroom lab in a 4-foot by 6-foot walk-in closet in their apartment in Florida. They moved and set up shop initially inside their home in an 8-foot by 16-foot back room. Eight acres and a home in rural Easley (not too far from Clemson) very near Interstate 85 proved to be just what the couple needed. Finally, a house - just before returning to Florida - turned out to be the one. Criteria included acreage for production buildings and access to a major highway. They married and flew twice to South Carolina, perusing at least 100 properties throughout the state. Tradd convinced Olga to entertain the idea of moving to South Carolina, which he considered his home state even though he had lived all over the world while growing up. He knew they could not stay in Florida to cultivate mushrooms due to weather conditions. Olga used her skills as a professional graphic and web designer to help Tradd establish a business plan and marketing presence. “She saw potential in the farm and business.” “She ignited in me a drive to start Mushroom Mountain,” Tradd says. All became successful in their own right. A tenacious spirit took the family to refugee areas throughout Europe, and from there they moved to Canada and ultimately immigrated to America. She and her sister, Billie Katic, were teenagers in Croatia when they had to escape the Bosnian War with nothing more than literally the clothes on their backs. Work at nurseries along the way also imbibed in him a continuing education about plant life. People began to hear of his mushroom knowledge, and he was contacted regularly for lecturing to garden clubs and other groups. He says the police were once called because a mushroom walk drew hundreds and caused traffic and parking issues. “I was living nowhere near any mountains.”įor the next 10 or so years, Tradd learned and practiced landscape design in Hilton Head and Florida, but always with an eye toward mushroom education, identification, and agriculture. He left there in 1994 knowing he would have his own mushroom farm that he would call Mushroom Mountain. For two years, he worked and absorbed the science of mushroom growing, learning to identify varieties and even finding wild chanterelles, which he sold to area chefs. So fascinated was he by the mushrooms that the owner asked him if he wanted a job. When Tradd was 20, having landed in Summerville after a lifetime of moves due to his father’s military career, he toured a mushroom farm on John’s Island on a whim. ![]()
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