EASTHAMPTON - For the first time in years Rodney A. Britt is going to have a chance to do the job that has always been his passion - farming.

On Sunday, he and his wife, Gail M. Flood joined with representatives of a variety of federal, state, local and private agencies to celebrate the purchase and conservation of Echodale Farm on Park Hill Road.

"We feel like we got away with something," Britt said.

"It is a life-long dream for Rodney and me," Flood said.

Britt grew up in Deerfield and worked at his family's farm in Amherst. As an adult he has run a number of home and garden stores, named 57 Sheffield. Some are now sold and Flood will take over running the remaining business, which is run partly on-line and out of a store in Boston, while Britt will run the farm.

Britt said he will focus on raising heritage breeds of animals and has already begun with the purchase of five Leicester Longwool sheep, of which there are only 400 in the country. He plans to add one of two types of milk and beef cattle and raise Gloucester Spotted pigs.

The couple will also grow hay, straw, corn and other crops, he said.

The two, who live in Belchertown and have a blended family of seven children, said they are making repairs and converting the two-family farm house back into a single family.

Since they purchased the farm in June, Britt also made repairs to the barn and has been working in the field, they said.

While it is a lot of work, Flood said she just takes it one project at a time.

The work to save the farm was also a long project that began in 2005 when city leaders learned owners were planning to sell it for developers. The city had three months to set up a plan to save the 165-acre farm, said Craig MacDonnell, state director for the Trust for Public Land, a national, non-profit land conservation organization.

The Trust for Public Land purchased the farm in 2006 while a variety of agencies began raising money for the project.

Speaker after speaker talked about the amazing joint effort that was put together to raise $2.85 million. There were state grants, the city of Easthampton chipped in, the city's Pascommuck Conservation Trust helped and as many as 500 people made donations.

Britt and Flood purchased the farm and the house for $550,000. They said they were already looking for a piece of farm land when they read about the Easthampton project in the paper.

The hitch is they will not be able to sell it to developers, but can resell it to be farmed.

State Rep. John W. Scibak, D-South Hadley, talked about the value of preserving the land as well as keeping the property as a working farm, especially with the increasing fuel prices making it more expensive to ship food.

"It is not a thing of the past, it is a think of the present and hopefully a thing of the future," he said.