Blue Ridge Country

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Burt Robeson: "I spy, with my little eye, something that starts with C."
Vicky: "Corn.”
—Children of the Corn (1984)

In the twisting labyrinth of corn the large stalks stretch their leaves to the sky, blocking mountains and the setting sun. Tiny kids run past us, their voices echoing down the paths. A family of four stands at an intersection baffled. Left or right? As my friend and I pass them, we give them a gentle nudge in the right direction. We’d gone down the left side and it was a dead end. They smile graciously and we all continue on.

We might’ve been in the Layman Family Farm’s maze for two hours, or it may have been just 10 minutes. Outside the gigantic corn maze sits other exciting experiences. A cow train ride, a potato canon, a no-left-turn min-maze – there is plenty for us to do and see. But what I love most about my visit was the ease that fills the place.

Families play football in the pumpkin patch, while children slide down a giant “Beale Mine Shaft” slide. A small concession stand and Fry Shack offers funnel cakes, fried Oreos and drinks. Picnic tables are filled with waiting grandmas as their grandchildren ride around on a hayride. The low, fall sun dazzles everything in honey, whispering at me to take a breath. To pause. Even the maze, with its crisscrossing paths and very few exits, has a quiet pace to it. Families completedthe maze together, not competitively, strangers help one another out, and the cheerful encouragement of corn cops evaporates any of my fears.

As we finish the second, more challenging part of the maze, which is shaped like a U.S. penny in honor of Lincoln’s 200th anniversary, I feel an overwhelming sense of accomplishment. I have just gone through 11.5 acres of corn stalks and survived to tell the tale. Along the way I heard the phrase “Children of the Corn” spoken an innumerable amount of times. When we arrive blinking and laughing in the sunset, we almost go through again but for the animals in the petting zoo calling for our attention.

Layman Family Farms is associated with the world’s largest corn maze company, The MAiZE. The perfectly named Brett Herbist, a Brigham Young University agribusiness graduate, launched The MAiZE in American Fork, Utah, attracting 18,000 people in only three weeks during the fall of ’96. Since then the company has grown more than 200 mazes throughout the States, Canada, Italy, Poland and the United Kingdom. To find the closest maze near you follow the link: http://www.cornfieldmaze.com/site_list.html