Ray Gack’s experience with cattle started back when he was in high school, “I was milking for a friend, the last three years of high school, says Ray. I would get up at 4:00 a.m. and milk about 70 cows and go home and shower and go to school. After school I got into the dairy business on my own, and milked till 1985.”
“Then I went into law enforcement after that, and stayed until 1990,” continued Ray, “I took a year off and started milking again with a friend. My kids started showing cattle about that time, they started off showing Holsteins.”
Ray who now lives outside Midland, Ark., recalled “Buck and Pam Wilson’s farm had Santa Gertrudis cattle, so the kids and I went and looked. We really liked the cattle, so we bought a heifer from the Wilsons and started showing her. The kids also loved going to the fairs to show. They never rode the rides, I didn’t spend a single dime on a ride I don’t believe,” said Ray. “The kids went to win, that’s how much they loved showing cattle. My son, Brian, won two years in a row at the Jr. National Show, and the prize there was a heifer. Then they won the Purple Circle three or four times. My kids never got mad at a better cow for winning.”
“When they got older they got away from it, and my son, Brian, sold his herd to Angie Cook, a friend of the family. It was then, on July 6, 2008, that Brian got killed in a car wreck, so from July 6 to August we did a memorial for Brian. We went to Little Rock with shirts showing, as a memorial for Brian, he had friends all over the country. He was always helping the kids before a show, clipping their cattle for them or just helping out the other kids that were showing. I decided to start back with a herd and bought four heifers from Angie. Brian had always wanted to get a bull from a farm in Georgia. Annett and I went down there and started looking at the young bull, but didn’t like the lines he had, so we drove around the pasture looking for another one. Annett pointed a little one out and said he’s cute, so I got out and looked at him and went ‘wow.’ Then I looked at his momma and his daddy and said ‘I want him.’”
“I went back and got him in six or seven months, and broke him to lead, he is my best friend now, I pretty much know what he’s thinking and him me. Brian is not only a show bull he is my herd bull. He is very easy to manage, but I am the only one that can show him because of his size.”
Ray and Annett went to the State Fair with their cattle this year and won senior champion bull with Brian, calf champion, overall grand champion and best of polled. All in all they won three grand champions and one reserve champion.
