Ann McGlynn, who launched the Quad Cities nonprofit group that grows food and helps refugees, will be honored with a top Iowa humanitarian award.
The World Food Prize Foundation announced this week that Ms. McGlynn, founder and executive director of Tapestry Farms in Davenport, as the recipient of the 2025 Robert D. Ray Iowa SHARES Humanitarian Award.
Ms. McGlynn is being recognized for her leadership in advancing sustainable food access throughout the Quad Cities. Their her nonprofit reclaimed underutilized land to grow more than 20,000 pounds of fresh, culturally relevant produce, thus strengthening local food systems and nourishing communities in need.
Ms. McGlynn will formally receive the Iowa SHARES Award at the annual Iowa Hunger Summit on Wednesday, July 16, at the Norman E. Borlaug Hall of Laureates in Des Moines. Registration is now open for the Iowa Hunger Summit.
Tapestry Farms is a nonprofit urban farm system that invests in refugees who live in the Quad Cities. The organization focuses on three areas: growing food, offering social services, and building the community’s welcoming infrastructure.
“Ann McGlynn’s work with Tapestry Farms is a powerful example of how a local initiative can turn untapped land into vital sources of fresh food,” said Mashal Husain, president, World Food Prize Foundation. “Her commitment to expanding sustainable food access across the Quad Cities embodies the values of compassion, resilience and community the Robert D. Ray Iowa SHARES Humanitarian Award proudly recognizes. We invite everyone to celebrate Ann’s achievements and engage with leaders tackling hunger at the Iowa Hunger Summit on July 16.”
Feeds QC year-round
In 2024, Tapestry Farms grew more than 11,000 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables through the help of more than a dozen staff members, interns and 300 volunteers.
The farm operates at 12 locations across the Quad Cities from April to October. It also operates hydroponically year-round in a 320-square-foot shipping container. It was fully funded by the John Deere Foundation and installed in 2023. The operation enables Tapestry Farms to grow an additional 2 tons to 6 tons of produce annually.
Food pantries, nonprofits, a monthly subscription service and a farmers market distribute that harvest. This year, the Quad Cities Community Foundation awarded $300,000 over three years to Tapestry Farms. It will enable them to nearly triple the pounds of food grown and more than double the families served by their culturally specific food pantry.
The organization also recently launched a Growing Illowa Food Together ( GIFT) Garden program to inspire backyard gardeners to donate some of their gardens’ bounty to shoe in need.
Founded in 2017, Tapestry Farms not only cultivates food but also supports refugee families with housing, medical and mental healthcare, education, employment, transportation and community connections. They work with about 25 families at a time and have served more 130 since their founding.
Ms. McGlynn was inspired to start Tapestry Farms when she worked at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Davenport. That congregation welcomed a refugee mother and her six children from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Seeing the greater need in her community and echoing Gov. Ray’s commitment decades earlier, Msl. McGlynn knew she had to help. That family — and a gifted bowl of spinach from their backyard —s parked the founding of Tapestry Farms and the growth of community food systems.
Ray an inspiration
“When Robert Ray made the decision to welcome refugees to the state of Iowa in the mid-1970s, he did so to save lives,” Ms. McGlynn said. “But he didn’t stop there. He worked to feed and care for people forcibly displaced from their homes in Cambodia. Then, he forged a path for our entire nation to welcome refugees as Iowa did, with the Refugee Resettlement Act of 1980.”
She added “Some of the most important people in my life are building their lives in Iowa because of Robert Ray’s persistence, and our work at Tapestry Farms seeks to nourish people just as he did. I consider it one of the greatest honors of my life to receive an award named for Governor Ray.”
Ms. McGlynn grew up on a small family farm in Clinton County, Iowa. After attending elementary school in Welton, and junior and senior high school in DeWitt, she became a two-time graduate of the University of Iowa. She earned a bachelor’s in journalism and a master’s in business administration.
