About Hidden Pastures
Built from lived experience. Grown through purpose.
Hidden Pastures began because we needed a place like this ourselves.
What started as a working farm for our own family has grown into a nonprofit where people can learn, build skills, connect with animals, contribute, and find meaningful ways to belong.
Our Story
Hidden Pastures was founded by Allie McCutcheon and Brian Heid as a working farm for their own family. Both are military veterans, and what started as something their family needed has grown into a nonprofit serving people of different ages and backgrounds.
The farm became a place where there was room to breathe.
Animals needed care. Work had to be done. Skills had to be learned. Problems had to be solved. Over time, that created room for confidence, connection, purpose, and belonging.
Hidden Pastures grew from the hope that someone else might come here carrying more than anyone can see, and find enough space to breathe, participate, and begin again.
Today, Hidden Pastures brings together people, animals, and purpose through programs, riding lessons, camps, private experiences, volunteering, events, and community participation.
Why a Working Farm?
The farm is not just a setting for programs — it is part of how people learn.
Real Responsibility
Animals depend on real care, and farm work does not pause for a bad day. That kind of responsibility is part of what makes the learning here real.
Changing Conditions
Weather, seasons, and animals are never entirely predictable. Learning to adapt is part of everyday life on a working farm.
Skills That Take Practice
Confidence here is built through repetition, not shortcuts — real skills that often do not come easily at first.
Natural Consequences
Chores done well or left undone have a visible, immediate effect. The farm teaches through cause and effect, not lectures.
What We Believe
Participation
People grow by making choices, trying new things, and taking responsibility — at their own pace.
Competence
Confidence comes from learning real skills through repetition and practice, not shortcuts.
Contribution
People find purpose in having something meaningful to offer and problems worth solving.
Belonging
People do not need to become someone else before they are allowed to take part. There is room here for different ages, backgrounds, and life experiences.
Animals have real needs, boundaries, and wellbeing that come first. Safety and respect make participation possible for everyone.
The farm does not give people answers. It gives them a place to practice finding their own.
Veterans, Family, and Lived Experience
Allie and Brian are both veterans, and their own experience of finding purpose, responsibility, and peace through farm life helped shape what Hidden Pastures became.
As veterans, and through their family’s experience with domestic violence and difficult seasons of life, they learned how hard it is to learn, connect, or move forward when your body does not feel safe. Not because the animals had answers or the land fixed anything, but because having something real to participate in mattered.
Hidden Pastures does not claim to be a solution for every veteran or every hard season — but that experience is part of why this farm exists, and why real participation matters here.
The People Behind Hidden Pastures
Hidden Pastures is family-built and still deeply hands-on. The people leading it are also the people caring for animals, maintaining the farm, teaching, solving problems, and showing up every day.
Allie McCutcheon
Founder & Executive Director | U.S. Army Veteran
Allie leads much of Hidden Pastures’ programming, partnerships, and participant experience. As a veteran, mother, and domestic violence survivor, she knows what it is like to move through seasons where simply feeling safe enough to breathe can feel like a big step.
She’s just as likely to be found helping with animals or figuring out what the farm needs next as she is behind the scenes with programs and partnerships.
She believes people do not need to be fixed — they need meaningful opportunities to participate, contribute, and discover what they are capable of.
Brian Heid
Co-Founder & Director of Farm Operations | U.S. Marine Veteran
Brian helped build Hidden Pastures from the ground up and keeps the farm running day to day. As a Marine veteran, he brings a strong belief in responsibility, practical work, and doing things the right way — animal care, property projects, repairs, and the countless jobs that never make it onto a to-do list.
He believes there is value in learning to do things well, taking pride in your work, and being part of something that depends on you.
That practical, steady approach is woven into much of what Hidden Pastures has become.
Katie McCutcheon
Board Member | Rider | Riding Coach | Agricultural Education Student
Katie has been part of Hidden Pastures from the beginning and has grown alongside the farm. A lifelong rider, she has helped shape riding and youth experiences here through her focus on safety, patience, and learning real skills.
Katie is currently attending college pursuing Agricultural Education. School now keeps her away from the farm much of the year, but she remains part of the Hidden Pastures board and contributes when she is home.
Katie’s path feels very much like Hidden Pastures itself: learn something real, take responsibility for it, and keep growing from there.
What began as something our family needed has grown into a place where many different people can learn, contribute, and belong.
Mission & Vision
Our Mission
Hidden Pastures creates meaningful farm-based experiences where people can learn, build practical skills, connect with animals and others, contribute through real participation, and grow through choice, responsibility, and purpose.
Our Vision
A community where people of different ages, backgrounds, abilities, and life experiences have access to meaningful places where they can participate, belong, build confidence through competence, and discover new possibilities for themselves.
Come Find Your Place at Hidden Pastures
Some people come to learn.
Some come to work.
Some come because they love animals.
Some come because they need a place to breathe.
Whatever brings you here, we hope you find something real to be part of.