Neighbors

Less than a mile from David and Gayla Holcombe’s home near Jay, Okla. is the schoolhouse where David’s grandparents and mother taught. Following in their footsteps, David earned his degree in Agriculture Education, which he taught for 20 years. Although David no longer teaches vocational agriculture, he has dedicated his farm to “educational demonstration”. They have participated in field days and hosted tour groups to observe conservation practices. He also serves on the Oklahoma Board of Agriculture.

It keeps going.

Today, most everybody is concerned about his or her health and the health of their family. Marvin and Linda Jones, owners of AJ Grass Fed Farms in West Fork, Ark., are concerned about the way they eat.

Kerry Rose has a rare profession. He is a farmer, and he is proud of it. Though many people reading this article are farmers and ranchers, there are fewer every day. When not working on his farm, Kerry works with the Missouri Corn Growers Association (MCGA) to help make sure farmers and ranchers remember they are on the same team.

Bob Chapman has always been a dual career man. For 32 years his life revolved in area vocational schools in Eldon, Rolla and Waynesville where he was school director for 25 years. Four years ago, when he retired from the educational system, he found his opportunity to move to his farm in Dent County, which he had worked towards for many years. Today, in addition to the farm, he also works at the Leonard Wood Institute, a part of the Ft. Leonard Wood system that provides research and development funding to the army, defense contractors, the university and entrepreneurs.

Kenny Hinkle is not psychic, but he tries to be. While many people don’t know what they are going to have for dinner next weekend, Kenny is working hard to make sure that we can have high quality and reasonably priced beef on our tables – 5 years from now.

It happens at the worst time. Your horse has thrown another shoe right when you are packing up for a ride. Now, you have to call a farrier. What if there was another option? A barefooted option.

"I was a California girl and I can remember that I always wanted to live like the Walton’s,” recalled Stormy Woods. Stormy and her husband Ed, own a farm just north of Hagarville and have been married for about 4 years. “Ed knew that I loved animals,” said Stormy. “So, he took me to a livestock sale, and that’s where I bought a red goat and it’s just grown from there.”

On a crisp fall day in Wyandotte, Okla., Randy and Jeff Parmley take a break from working cattle to explain why their family farm doesn’t play the ‘trend game.’ “We don’t jump on trends,” said Randy Parmley. “We just breed consistent cattle – simple as that.”

Dick Nugent is a Master Gardener and the manager of the Community Garden at the Houston branch of the University of Missouri Extension Service. He is just one spoke in a wheel that has been turning for a long time. The University of Missouri, founded in 1839, was the first publicly supported institution in the Louisiana Territory.  In 1888 the Missouri Agriculture Experiment Station was opened in Columbia, Mo. Later, in 1910, the Missouri Extension Council was established and ready to reach out to all areas of the state. In the past century they have worked, studied, analyzed and recorded successes as well as failures of hundreds of ways to get the most out of Missouri land.