Wayne and Deb Seider are passing down a legacy on their family farm
BUTLER, MO. – “My dad is an interesting character” said Stacey Lawson when speaking about her father Wayne Seider, “He is always surrounded by people. He draws a crowd wherever he goes, and he doesn’t know a stranger. Anywhere we go in the state of Missouri he knows somebody and has a connection with them.”
Wayne and Deb Seider were married in 1972 and have resided on the same farm since then. “The farm was purchased by my great-grandfather August Hellwig from the Skully Land Lease in the late 1930s.” Stacey states. Over the years the farm has operated as a dairy farm, hog farm, hay operation, sheep production and cow/calf pair production.
The farm consists of two hundred and sixty acres with another two hundred and sixty acres of ground in other places. In the early years, the Seiders had farrowing sows, and Deb raised around a hundred and twenty head of Suffolk sheep for meat production.
The cattle herd averaged a hundred head of crossbred cows for the market. “Mom has always worked right beside Dad in whatever he needed to be done.” Stacey said.
Both Wayne and Deb are retired now, Deb taught for twenty-five years in the Butler School District. Wayne has worked for several well-known businesses in Missouri; GM Feedyards in Rockville, Missouri; Diamond O Feedyard in Butler, Missouri; and the Missouri Beef House where he still serves in an advisory role.
In 1991 Wayne was named the Missouri Cattle Auctioneer of the Year, in 1997 he was named the Bates County Cattleman of the Year and in 2021 he received the Bates County Cattleman’s Pioneer Cattleman Award for a lifetime of service to the Missouri beef industry and his dedicated work with the local, state and national Cattlemen’s associations. “He is full of old age wisdom” quips Stacey “and he is about half right most of the time.” She continues, “He and my mother do a lot of things behind the scenes.”
They support the Bates County Fair where Deb has been a 4H leader for more than forty years. They have both been involved with their children, and their grandchildren’s 4H and FFA projects, supporting them when they were showing sheep, cattle, horses and chickens. They are the kind of people who, whatever their kids or grandkids are doing, they are there helping out.
They support every fund raiser that is going on. They are members of the Pleasant Gap Church where Deb plays the piano and has taught at Sunday School. Wayne is still an auctioneer and does a lot of charity events. “I am not sure how many thousands of dollars he has helped raise for Cattlemen’s, schools and local communities. He is truly a people person and will give the shirt right off his back to someone if they are in need.”
The Seiders have two daughters and four grandchildren: Dr. Stacey Lawson of Butler, Missouri, serves as the Director of Special Services for the Butler R-V School District and Whitney Mott, from Kansas, Oklahoma. Stacey has two children, Maylen and Reece, and Whitney and her husband Cole have two boys Cooper and Caydo.
Currently, they are renting their farm to their grandson Reece who is working to build his own herd of Red Angus cattle. Reece is eighteen and will graduate high school in May 2025. He started his herd as his FFA SAE project. His grandparents have been there with him every step of the way.
Stacey says, “Now that Dad is retired, he has two sheep, two goats and a donkey that he is responsible for. He is not a porch rocker. He gets his daily gospel at the local coffee shop; he drives around Butler and visits his friends. He visits the nursing homes and walks at the hospital with his ‘posse’. He comes home, does his chores and helps Reece by telling him what he needs to do. He raises the occasional bottle calf for Reece. He is basically the straw-boss. He is quite a character.” She continues, “we are all so blessed for the way we grew up. To have had the experiences my parents provided for us. We were not the wealthiest people. We didn’t have the biggest house, truck or trailer. We didn’t have the best show animals, but we had so much support. We always had everything we needed and got to do everything we wanted to do. We had the best life and the best examples for parents, and they are the best grandparents anyone could ask for.
