Eastern Iowa Farmer Fall 2018

The Eastern Iowa Fall 2018
Farmer
A Publication of Sycamore Media
WHY
FARMERS
MATTER
Eastern Iowa farmers don’t just feed the
globe; they fuel the local economy and
make their communities better places to live.
TRADE AND AG: How will area farmers
be impacted by global trade negotiations?
PARTS GUYS: With their encyclopedic
knowledge of equipment, they keep farmers
running.
BBQ KING: Warren Moeller of Miles
is a former Iowa State Fair and statewide
champion griller. Learn his secrets.
PLUS:
Four pages of photos of your
friends and neighbors!

PRODUCTS PLACED
TO PERFORM
IN IOWA
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THAT’S SEEDSMANSHIP AT WORK ® . 209-53STXRIB
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Brand Blends
Geoff Aper
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Karl Butenhoff
Agronomist
507-923-0311
Always read and follow IRM, where applicable, grain marketing and all other stewardship practices and pesticide label directions. Channel ® and the Arrow Design ® and Seedsmanship At Work ®
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Expert Channel Seedsmen In Your Area
Janell Slattery
Channel Seedsman
Maquoketa, Iowa
563-357-4057
Max McNeil
Channel Seedsman
Preston, Iowa
563-357-2381
DEALER
DEALER
Logan Goettsch
Channel Seedsman
Calamus, Iowa
563-370-6315
Bob Gannon
Channel Seedsman
De Witt, Iowa
563-357-9876
DEALER
DEALER

“
Dale,
Marilyn and their crew were great to work with.
I visited several other horse barns before deciding
what I wanted to do for my own. Everything is custom
to my needs and they were great at listening to my
ideas and executing my plans. I had a great experience
working with these guys.”
— Angel Schiffer, owner of the barn pictured below in Maquoketa
Pictured left to right: Marilyn and Dale Junk,
owners Dale Junk Wick Buildings,
Kyle Schiffer, Angel Schiffer, Jeff Junk, and Mark Junk.
563-872-4166 | 877-451-3007 | buddej@iowatelecom.net

Dale
Junk
• CommerCial Warehousing
• retail sales/ shoW rooms
• mini-Warehouses
• muniCipal garages/shops
• offiCes
• airplane hangars
• fairground Buildings
• apt./garages
• dairy Barns
• Calf housing
• Cattle sheds
• ChurChes
• manufaCturing faCilities
• maChine storage
• insulated shops
• horse Barns/riding arenas
• utility Buildings
• garages
Dale & Marilyn Junk, owners | 23501 415th Avenue, Bellevue, IA 52031

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563-212-2438
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563-212-8300
Andover
563-357-1117
Maquoketa

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ADVERTISING INDEX
ABSTRACT & TITLE
GUARANTY COMPANY..........................129
AMERICAN MUTUAL.....................................36
ARENSDORF AG LIME.................................25
ARENSDORF ROCK QUARRY..................141
BELLEVUE SAND & GRAVEL.......................88
BELLEVUE STATE BANK............................136
BELLEVUE VET CLINIC................................67
BOUSSELOT TILING.....................................19
BRAET’S AUTO SERVICE........................... 111
BRANDENBURG DRAINAGE.......................28
BREEDEN SALES..........................................15
BUTTERNUT HOLLOW CRAFTS.................78
CASCADE LUMBER......................................17
CENTRAL DEWITT
PERFORMING ARTS CENTER................65
CHANNEL SEED..............................................2
CHUCK’S BODY SHOP.................................84
CITIZENS STATE BANK................................60
CITIZENS FIRST BANK.................................23
CLINTON COUNTY DEMOCRATS...............61
CLINTON NATIONAL BANK........................106
CLOVER RIDGE PLACE...............................90
COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
OF GREATER DUBUQUE......................118
COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
OF JACKSON COUNTY........................118
CORNELIUS SEED........................................89
COUNTY LINE AG........................................116
CUSTOM DOZING AND
CRANE SERVICE, INC..............................72
D&T CONCRETE............................................39
DALE JUNK.......................................................4
DEEP CREEK APPLICATORS......................59
DELANEY AG.................................................24
DELANEYS AUTO & AG................................43
DELMAR GRAIN SERVICE, INC...................58
DEWITT BANK & TRUST.............................148
DEWITT HOSPITAL FOUNDATION..............86
DEWITT REGIONAL HOSPITAL...................95
DOSLAND AUCTIONS.................................110
EAST CENTRAL CONSULTING...................39
EAST IOWA REAL ESTATE...........................82
EASTERN IOWA FARMER..........................112
EASTERN IOWA PROPANE.........................21
EBERHART FARM CENTER.........................68
FARM BUREAU............................................137
FARM BUREAU FINANCIAL SERVICES.....91
FARM CREDIT SERVICES............................55
FARMERS CREEK ANTIQUES...................113
FIRST CENTRAL STATE BANK....................62
FRANCES BANTA WAGGONER
COMMUNITY LIBRARY..........................115
FRANZEN FAMILY TRACTORS....................50
GREEN TECH.................................................54
HEARTLAND COTTONS...............................22
HERITAGE MUTUAL......................................20
HERMES AUTO & UPHOLSTERY................46
HOSTETLER PRECISION AG.......................41
IOWA CONCRETE PRODUCTS...................64
IRISH MEADOWS
YARN BARN & BOUTIQUE....................125
J.J. SCHECKEL..............................................74
J&S AUTO.......................................................48
JACKSON COUNTY FARM BUREAU........128
JACKSON COUNTY REGIONAL
HEALTH CENTER....................................... 11
JEFF REED STATE FARM...........................117
JIM LEE INSURANCE....................................29
JONES COUNTY COMMUNITY
FOUNDATION...........................................118
KEENEY WELDING.......................................47
KEN KRUGER................................................96
KRUGER SEED................................................6
KUNAU IMPLEMENT...................................130
LEGACY INSURANCE GROUP....................66
LG SEEDS....................................................124
LINCOLNWAY COMMUNITY
FOUNDATION..........................................118
LOW MOOR AG..............................................38
MAC’S WINE CELLAR.................................113
MAQUOKETA FINANCIAL GROUP..............40
MAQUOKETA LIVESTOCK SALES............138
MAQUOKETA LUMBER...............................139
MAQUOKETA STATE BANK..........................33
MARTENS ANGUS FARMS..........................98
MEANT TO BE WITH FLOWERS.................16
MELISSA BURKEN MOMMSEN...................70
MERSCHMAN SEEDS...................................94
MINER, GILROY & MEADE...........................45
NIENKE SERVICES.....................................127
NISSEN-CAVEN ............................................77
INSURANCE AND REAL ESTATE
OHNWARD FARM MANAGEMENT..............97
OHNWARD INSURANCE GROUP...............44
OHNWARD TAX, ACCOUNTING
& BUSINESS SERVICES.........................100
OHNWARD WEALTH RETIREMENT...........30
OSTERHAUS PHARMACY...........................35
PARK FARMS COMPUTER SYSTEMS.......14
PATTI ROBINSON........................................102
PEOPLES COMPANY..................................146
PETERSEN INSURANCE............................133
PIONEER SEED...........................................107
PMC AGRI-SERVICE.....................................93
PRAIRIE HILLS RETIREMENT.....................57
REGENCY RETIREMENT.............................81
RIVER VALLEY COOPERATIVE...................69
ROEDER BROTHERS.................................140
ROEDER IMPLEMENT..................................99
ROLLING HILLS VETERINARY SERVICE...49
SCHERRMAN’S IMPLEMENT.......................56
SCHOENTHALER, BARTELT,
KAHLER & REICKS....................................79
SCHUELLER & SONS
RECONSTRUCTION..................................92
SCHUSTER & CO..........................................67
SCOTT & OBERBROECKLING..................122
SHEETS CONSTRUCTION.........................123
SPAIN AG SERVICE.....................................103
STEINES TREE SERVICE.............................39
STICKLEY ELECTRIC...................................32
THE CROSSROADS INSPIRED LIVING
AND GARDEN CAFÉ..................................75
THE ENGEL AGENCY...................................42
THE FEED AND GRAIN STORE...................63
THEISENS....................................................131
THRIVENT FINANCIAL..................................19
TIM M C CLIMON..............................................76
VEACH DIESEL REPAIR...............................31
WELTER SEED & HONEY CO......................18
WHEATLAND MANOR.................................109
WHISPERING MEADOWS RESORT...........47
WHITE FRONT SEED....................................73
WYFFELS HYBRIDS......................................83
ZIRKELBACH HOME APPLIANCES...........101
8 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

STORY INDEX
52
Why Farmers Matter
Read about how area farmers are producing the meats and grains that feed
the planet while providing the economic backbone of almost everything in Eastern Iowa.
‘WORTH
HIS WEIGHT
IN GOLD’
12
When a farmer is
broke down and
needs to get running,
he turns to the one
man who can help –
the parts man.
ADM:
KERNELS OF
COMMERCE
26
For more than a century,
the ADM plant in Clinton
has been turning corn
from local farmers into
products that are shipped
around the globe.
TRADE
AND AG:
THE IMPACT
128
Trade negotiations,
weather, farm bill
results weigh on
farmers’ minds and
their bottom line.
MOELLER
IS KING
OF KINGS
134 Barbeque
champion earns
state fair title,
shares cooking
tips and recipes.
10 Despite industry issues,
fun still needs to be had
Letter from the publisher
34 New procedures
for dividing ‘heirs property’
in effect
37 Happy 100th
Jackson County Farm Bureau
celebrates a century, along
with state organization.
44 Embarking on a new chapter
Tom Leiting retires from River Valley
Coop after more than 30 years
in the agriculture business,
crediting success to member-owners.
114 A Midwest home
for a global operation
Italian ag machinery maker with
facilities worldwide plants its North
American roots firmly in DeWitt.
120 What Simple Life?
Beyond taking care of business,
farmers need to take care of
their mental health.
126 How to stay connected
with the FSA
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR

Farmer
The Eastern Iowa Fall 2018
A Publication of Sycamore Media
WHY
FARMERS
MATTER
Eastern Iowa farmers don’t just feed the
globe; they fuel the local economy and
make their communities better places to live.
TRADE AND AG: How will area farmers
be impacted by changes in the North American
Free Trade Agreement?
PARTS GUYS: With their encyclopedic
knowledge of equipment, they keep farmers
running.
BBQ KING: Warren Moeller of Preston
is a former Iowa State Fair and statewide
champion griller. Learn his secrets.
PLUS:
Four pages of photos of your
friends and neighbors!
The Eastern Iowa
Farmer
Sycamore Media President:
Trevis Mayfield
Advertising: Melissa Lane,
Kim Galloway, Trevis Mayfield,
Rosie Morehead, Maggie Ward
and Bob Wendt
Creative Director: Brooke Taylor
Editorial Content: Lowell Carlson,
Kellie Gregorich, Larry Lough,
Nancy Mayfield, Trevis Mayfield,
Sara Millhouse Adrienna Olson,
Kristine Tidgren
Photography Content:
Kelly Gerlach, Trevis Mayfield,
Brooke Taylor
Editors: Kelly Gerlach, Nancy Mayfield,
Trevis Mayfield
Published by: Sycamore Media
108 W. Quarry St., Maquoketa, IA
563-652-2441
Cover: Trevis Mayfield, Brooke Taylor
The Eastern Iowa Farmer is a specialty
publication of Sycamore Media Corp., 108
W. Quarry Street, Maquoketa, Iowa 52060,
563-652-2441 or 800-747-7377. No portion of
this publication may be reproduced without the
written consent of the publisher. Ad content is
not the responsibility of Sycamore Media Corp.
The information in this magazine is believed to
be accurate; however, Sycamore Media Corp.
cannot and does not guarantee its accuracy.
Sycamore Media Corp. cannot and will not
be held liable for the quality or performance
of goods and services provided by advertisers
listed in any portion of this magazine.
VIEW THE ENTIRE
MAGAZINE ONLINE
EIFARMER.COM
MESSAGE FROM THE PUBLISHER
Despite industry issues,
fun still needs to be had
Farmers in Eastern Iowa have a lot on
their minds these days.
As we visited with farmers and agriculture
professionals while working on
this issue of the Eastern Iowa Farmer,
it became clear that producers’ stress levels are
on the rise thanks to a combination of factors that
are creating an ever more challenging agriculture
environment.
Balance sheets are starting to get tight for
some growers, especially those who are still
paying off their ground.
Commodity prices, already low, are facing
additional pressures because of tariffs, and a drier-than-desired
summer may have dinged yields.
Of course, farmers
are conditioned to
expect the unexpected
and to cope with variables
outside of their
control. As they wait
out uncertain times,
they talk of enjoying
family and friends and
taking solace from
simple things.
Trevis Mayfield
President,
Sycamore Media Corp.
In that spirit, this
letter is dedicated to
some of the simple
pleasures and fine
people who made
producing this issue such a joy.
For me, there’s nothing quite like the combination
of food and people, and that’s why Marilyn
Kutzli and Julia Van Loo have found their way
into this column.
I met the two of them at Prairie Hills Assisted
Living in August. I was visiting the facility on
business when I learned that every once in a
while the kitchen staff prepared a special lunch
featuring family-favorite recipes from residents.
Recognizing a fun opportunity when I hear of
one, I shared my enthusiasm for the idea with
the facility’s marketing director and then, very
kindly, received an invitation.
On behalf of myself and my wife, Nancy, I
gladly accepted.
The recipe for the main course, salmon loaf,
was from Kutzli, a 95-year-old former one-room
school teacher, newspaper columnist and farm
wife.
The salmon loaf, a dish Kutzli said she had
made countless times to feed her husband and her
four sons, was outstanding. It was a staple at the
Kutzli farm near Miles for two reasons, according
to Kutzli. It was easy when she “needed to
throw things together,” and “it made a can of
expensive red Salmon feed six.”
The apple cake desert recipe was from Van
Loo, 88, whose husband worked
for Amoco selling chemicals to farmers. She got
the recipe from a friend in the 1970s and made it
“hundreds of times, thousands maybe.”
Sometimes, much fun was had working on
photo shoots for ads and stories.
In this issue, you will find a story not about
the Barbeque King, but about the King of Kings,
a distinction won by Warren Moeller of Miles a
few years back during a cook-off at the state fair.
We interviewed Moeller the morning after he
had tended to his smoker throughout a sleepless
night.
Moeller hammed it up, wearing the crown he
had earned while doling out samples of delicious
brisket. You’ve probably figured out by now that
one of my favorite simple things is food.
Silly fun is also high on my list, and that’s
why our photo shoot for Rolling Hills Veterinary
Service stands out.
The photo featured not only the business’s
staff, but also horses, a dairy calf, a show cow, an
alpaca and two dogs. There was even a buffalo
calf in reserve that did not make it into the shot.
Somehow, we got all of them to look at the camera
with eyes open all at once. (Whew!)
We hope you enjoy this magazine as much as
we enjoyed working with the area farm community
to produce it and don’t forget that you can
check out an electronic version at eifarmer.com.
And, as always, we appreciate all the support
we receive from our advertisers who make this
magazine possible.
Sincerely,
Eastern Iowa Farmer Photo / Trevis Mayfield
Left, Marilyn Kutzli and Julia Van Loo pose
together after sharing a meal with residents and
guests at Prairie Hills Assisted Living in Clinton.
Trevis Mayfield,
Sycamore Media president
10 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

Carter Mohr
Midland High School,
Wyoming
Senior
Miranda Peters
Marquette High School,
Bellevue
Junior
Lane Stender
Maquoketa High School,
Maquoketa
Sophomore
Safety
on the court,
in the gym,
and on the field
Baseline concussion screenings offer
insights for student competitors
Bree Moore,
Jackson County
Regional Health
Center ATC,
Marquette High School,
Bellevue,
Class of 2011
Bree Moore, Certified Athletic Trainer
provides sideline sports injury assessment
and concussion follow-up testing to
Maquoketa and surrounding schools.
Baseline concussion testing measures an
athlete’s health in real time. Bree and the
Physical Therapy staff test reaction time,
memory, balance and basic brain function.
Call 563-652-4064 to learn how concussion
screening can protect your student athlete.
QuAlIty CAre. PeoPle you KnoW.
Jackson county
Regional HealtH centeR
GeneSIS heAlth SySteM
700 W Grove St, Maquoketa, IA • (563) 652-2474
genesishealth.com/jacksoncounty

‘Worth
his weight
in gold’
When a farmer is broke down
and needs to get running,
he turns to the one man who
can help – the parts man.
BY KELLIE GREGORICH AND NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Farmer Dennis Hogan
never underestimates
the importance of a
good parts man to keep
his operation moving.
“If you’ve got beans ready to combine, there’s a thunderstorm
in the forecast and you break down, it can be really frustrating,”
said Hogan, who grows soybeans and corn on his farm west of
Monticello. “If you can’t run, it can hurt your bottom line. It
might be a week or 10 days before you can get back out into the
field.”
Hogan, like most farmers, values a parts person who knows
tractors, combines and other equipment better than he does.
“The best ones are familiar with everything. It’s no good if
you have to explain every little thing,” he said. “It also helps
if they have real knowledge about the equipment. And, a good
12 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

EASTERN IOWA
FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
Retired farmer Marty Spies uses his background to help customers
at Kunau Implement in DeWitt. He has memorized multiple tractor parts
and their corresponding numbers over the years.

THE PARTS MAN
parts man can improvise. They
may not have exactly what you
need, but they can figure something
else out; or, they make a call
and get you what you need.”
Adam Zirkelbach, the parts manager
at Scherrman’s Implement in
Monticello, is that guy for Hogan.
They’ve worked together for
several years.
“He’s my ‘go to’ guy,” Hogan
said. “He knows things inside and
out.”
When Zirkelbach was a teenager,
he liked to work on older-model
cars.
“It was always fun for me to
track down the parts,” he said, and
that interest served him well on his
journey to his current job. He started
out working in automotive parts
Pictured, left to right: Julie Hansen,
Phyllis Hofer, Justin Stolk,
Mike Hofer and Michael Schaeffer
Adam Zirkelbach works at Scherrman’s
Implement in Monticello. He enjoys the pursuit
of tracking down parts for his customers.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
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parkfarmscomputer.com
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14 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

THE PARTS MAN
sales in Cedar Rapids, but a
farm boy at heart, he made
his way back into agriculture
parts. Zirkelbach grew up on a
farm in Scotch Grove, and he
lives there today. The ag parts
business is a good fit for him,
he said.
“If you are interested in
something, it makes the work
more fun, and I want to go the
extra mile for a customer,” he
said.
Good memory a must
A survey of farmers in
Eastern Iowa paints a detailed
picture of a good parts person.
He doesn’t just look up
numbers in a catalog. He gets
to know each farmer and his
or her operation. He knows
“If you are interested in
something, it makes the
work more fun, and I
want to go the extra mile
for a customer.”
— ADAM ZIRKELBACH,
SCHERRMAN’S IMPLEMENT
the color of the tractors they
drive and what tractors tend
to be most problematic. He
understands that it’s frustrating
to be broken down, and
he wants to help farmers get
back up and running as fast
as possible. He becomes a
friend, someone who can be
relied upon and trusted, and
someone who is willing to go
above and beyond to help.
Those are traits Marty Spies
has kept in mind in his 25
years as the parts manager for
Kunau Implement in DeWitt.
About eight years ago, he
retired from farming his own
80 acres, which he’d done for
three decades.
“That helped tremendously,”
Spies said of his farming.
“I had a lot of hands-on experience.
I can relate to what
people are going through in
the fields.”
He has memorized multiple
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 15

THE PARTS MAN
“All the knowledge
you pick up
on the farm as a
youngster doing
things really helps.”
— KEVIN STEIL,
ROEDER IMPLEMENT
tractor parts and their corresponding
numbers over the years, jokingly chalking
it up to “being lazy. I always tell
everyone I don’t want to have to look it
up. I just want to walk back and get it
without looking.”
To an observer, Spies and his crew
easily navigate their way among the rows
of bins, just beyond the parts desk, that
contain all sizes of nuts, bolts, screws
and other parts. When a customer comes
in with a description of a cotter pin
needed to get an old lawnmower up and
running, a workable part is produced in
just moments.
Being able to memorize and improvise
comes with time, Spies said. A few
cycles through a planting and growing
season and a system for remembering
develops. And while he knows many
common parts numbers, the parts catalog
Kevin Steil has been parts manager
at Roeder Implement in Dubuque
for 30 years. He’s watched the parts
industry grow and advance.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
Pictured: Owner
Lisa Duffy
Have some CHARM on your FARM
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16 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

THE PARTS MAN
is still an important aspect of his
job.
Everyone in the business has
their own system.
“For me, I am really good at
seeing things a few times and
memorizing them. I like the challenge,”
Zirkelbach said.
And their memory ranges from
parts for old equipment to new
equipment. For example, local
parts managers all know the parts
for the International Harvester
1066, which was produced from
1971 to 1976. More than 50,000
were manufactured in the six-year
run, making it a popular piece of
equipment on farms across the
Midwest.
“That was a bread-and-butter
A PARTNERSHIP
65 YEARS
IN THE MAKING
Here at Cascade Lumber, we know how important
Farmers are to our local economy. That’s why we are
proud to partner with our FFA chapter and help
educate students on the importance of agriculture
and building lasting relationships in the community.
We look forward to seeing you grow.
Cascade
Lumber Co.
BUILD YOUR FUTURE WITH US
563-852-3232 • 800-943-4685
Hwy. 151 E. • Cascade, Ia
caslbr@netins.net
www.caslbr.com
Top: John Noonan gives Cascade High School FFA advisor Milt Luckstead Jr. an honorary Cascade Lumber
team member shirt earlier this year. Standing with them are FFA members John Trumm and Rebecca Trumm.
Bottom: Packing lunches are Wil Roling, Rebecca Trumm, and Marie Knepper.
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 17

THE PARTS MAN
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / BROOKE TAYLOR
Whether they are lined up on a shelf, hung neatly for display, or tossed in a categorized box, parts are found throughout the implement stores.
tractor,” Spies said.
Said Zirkelbach, “For people
to be successful in the parts field
you have to be interested in what
you’re doing. If you aren’t interested
in parts and the mechanical
side, you’re not going to do good
at it. You have to be interested in
problem solving. That’s the key.”
Kevin Steil has been the parts
manager for Roeder Implement in
Dubuque for 30 years.
In that time he has watched the
parts industry grow and advance.
Steil grew up on his family farm
in Dubuque County and attended
Northeast Iowa Community College
(NICC) for mechanics after
he graduated from high school.
He said his education at NICC
has helped him tremendously with
his job, but also attributes his life
on the family farm as an instrumental
part of his knowledge.
“It helps down the road because
when you get behind the counter
you know the feeling of when
things break down. You know
what it feels like to need to get the
hay baled, to need to get the corn
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18 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

THE PARTS MAN
cut down. You know what it feels like and you know
they need that part,” he said.
Nuances such as whether a tractor is used in wheat
country or has fluid in its tires are crucial to understanding
what type of inventory needs to be maintained
for the farmers nearby, he said.
“It’s just basic knowledge of tractors and the operation
of equipment,” Steil said. It helps that anyone
working at the parts counter can have a mental image
of a machine and the parts of the machine. Many of
the younger people hired in the ag parts industry have
a good knowledge of equipment and work ethic, he
said.
For example, he said, if someone is putting up hay,
and they come in needing a part for a tedder (which is
a machine used in haymaking), it’s important that the
parts person knows what that is.
“All the knowledge you pick up on the farm as a
youngster doing things really helps,” he said.
In the ‘old days,’ parts inventory was done by
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 19

THE PARTS MAN
keeping track with pencil and
paper, he noted. Today, “no parts
leave the parts department without
being posted (electronically).
It helps keep inventory control
closer. That way we don’t have
to search for a part that says it’s
there, but it’s not.”
Tricks of the trade
Saving farmers time and headaches
is one thing parts people
strive for, Spies said.
He revealed some of his tricks.
First, if a farmer needs to know
how long a bolt is or the size of a
sprocket, for example, he or she
can measure it against a dollar
bill. A dollar bill is about 8-inches
long, and it provides a good frame
of reference for measuring things.
The second trick is for farmers
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Terry Sieverding, parts manager at Roeder Brothers Inc. in Bellevue, says that farmers have the
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THE PARTS MAN
best personalities.
who are out in the field without a pencil
or paper or phone. If they need to remember
the size of a part or how many
bolts they need, they can write it in the
dust on the fender of the machine.
The parts managers also suggested
taking a picture of the part needed and
sending it to them.
Cell phones have been “terrific,”
Steil said. Customers who are broken
down in the field can take a picture of
a part and email or text it to their parts
person, saving time.
“I’ve gotten many calls from someone
broken down in the field. They’ll
tell me, ‘I just took a picture of the part
I need. It’s on such and such a model.’
They can get me a picture of the serial
number, and I key that into the system,”
he said. That gives him the information
he needs for what in the ag industry is
called the code. It tells how the tractor
was built, when it came off the line,
if it’s heavy duty, and other particular
features.
“We’re able to find some of the
things we need to know. It’s critical,”
he said. For example, it’s about impossible
to order an air filter or other part
for a machine without that information
because there are so many variations
from tractor to tractor.
Building relationships
All the men said one of the favorite
parts of their job is building relationships
with farmers.
“Farmers will come in with the best
stories,” Steil said. He says through the
conversations he has with them he gets
to know them and their families.
Spies said that he sometimes feels
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 21

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THE PARTS MAN
like he’s getting paid to have a social life, adding
that he has met many people through his career and
considers some of his customers his closest friends.
He recalled a young man who had come into the store
often as a kid with his father.
“‘How long have you been here?’ he asked me,”
Spies said. “He said, ‘I can’t remember not coming in
here when you weren’t here.’”
Terry Sieverding has been the parts manager at
Roeder Brothers Inc. in Bellevue for six-and-a-half
years. A veteran of the printing industry who grew up
in Bellevue helping out on his grandparents’ farm, he
enjoys the variety of things he gets to do with his job.
Sieverding said farmers always have the best personalities,
and he enjoys building relationships.
“What’s nice about this work is you get to know
the personal side of people instead of just interacting
with a customer who comes up to the counter,” he
said. “You talk. You learn about what’s going on in
their lives.”
The personal interaction builds trust, which is
helpful in the stressful times — a breakdown during
planting or harvest.
“We know the most important thing is to get them
up and running,” Sieverding said.
Even when farmers are having a bad day they will
make the best of the situation, he said.
Ned Paulsen, who farms in Jones County, said he
values the relationship he has with his parts man,
Zirkelbach.
“It’s nice to see a familiar face,” said Paulsen, who
also restores antique tractors as a hobby. One of those
is a Farmall 504.
“Adam has helped me a lot on that,” he said.
Zirkelbach enjoys that part of his job.
“We have a lot of customers who restore tractors,
and I like finding parts,” he said. “We actually cater
to those types of people. The people here at the parts
counter are interested, too, in the kind of things you
grew up using or your grandpa had one.”
It’s that kind of service a farmer values, Paulsen
said.
“Once you find a good parts man, you really depend
on him,” Paulsen said. “A good parts man who
knows what you want and knows what you’re talking
about is worth his weight in gold.” n
22 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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Kernels of
For more than a century, the ADM plant in Clinton has been turning corn from local
in the United States. The company is embarking on a $200 million modernization at
So what
happens with
all that corn,
anyway?
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
When the
Clinton
Sugar
Refining Co.
opened a
corn wet-milling plant in 1907
on the banks of the Mississippi
River in Eastern Iowa, it could
grind 3,000 bushels of corn
daily. That translates into
about five semi-loads by
today’s standards.

EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Commerce
farmers into products that are shipped around the globe and used in every household
the location, an investment in Eastern Iowa farmers and their number one crop.
When Archer Daniels Midland
(ADM) began operating the plant
in 1982, it was grinding 130,000
bushels a day.
Today, ADM’s Clinton plant
has a daily grinding capacity of
325,000 bushels.
Those bushels of corn, much of
it delivered to ADM from local
farms, are transformed into raw
materials used in products made
and shipped around the world,
from ethanol and high-fructose
corn syrup to corn starch and
gluten meal for animal food.
“We’re very proud of what we
do here,” said Plant Manager Dean
Brainerd, who lives in DeWitt. He
began working at the plant shortly
after graduating from the University
of Wisconsin-Madison with a
degree in agriculture engineering

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KERNELS OF COMMERCE
31 years ago.
“This site was actually chosen
because of the lumber history in
Clinton,” Brainerd said of the
location, which today includes
three processing plants on 139
acres of property. “A lot of the
products that were made in the
early 1900s were shipped in
wooden barrels. There was actually
a barrel-making operation in
this plant.”
The proximity to river and rail
transportation also made it an
ideal spot.
Those early origins are juxtaposed
against a $200 million
modernization planned for the
more than 100-year-old plant,
which employs about 750 people,
over the next four years. The
investment speaks to the company’s
commitment to this area.
“We believe in this community.
We have a stake in it and in
our employees,” Brainerd said.
The project will include new
machinery and equipment, and a
building expansion.
“The modernization is happening
because our mill is really old,
and the equipment is outdated,”
Brainerd said. It’s costly to keep
it running in its current condition,
and equipment failure is a
risk.
“The project will help that
portion of the plant which is the
beginning of the corn milling
process to be more efficient, more
cost effective, and maximize
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 29

KERNELS OF COMMERCE
Corn Delivery
SOME
75 %
of the corn delivered
to ADM’s Clinton plant
arrives by truck.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
Vehicle Traffic
695 Trucks per day
375 Corn Trucks
30 Wet Feed
170 Supplies and Finished
Product Shipments
45 ADM Trucking
75 ADM Terminals
the yield from a kernel of
corn,” Brainerd said. “There
are four components to a
kernel of corn, and we want
to get the right material in the
right bucket.”
In a conference room at the
plant’s main office building,
Brainerd grabs a handful of
corn and uses a finger to separate
out just the right kernel
to illustrate those four components.
“The heart of a kernel of
corn is the germ,” he explained
about the first component.
It’s about 50 percent oil.
“In the wet-milling process,
each component to the kernel
of corn separates based on its
specific gravity,” he said, so
the oil floats, for example.
The second component is
the hull, which contains fiber;
and the third component is
gluten meal, which is 60 percent
protein. The gluten meal
is used in animal feed – for
dogs, cats, poultry and livestock
– and it’s what makes
egg yolks yellow.
“The fourth component is
starch,” he said. “That is really
what’s under the cap of the
corn. See that big white cap?
That’s the starch. That’s the
guy we want.”
The Clinton ADM plant is a
wet mill as opposed to a dry
mill, he said.
“That’s a huge difference.
Most of the new plants built
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KERNELS OF COMMERCE
around Iowa are dry mills. Dry
mills take the entire kernel and
grind all of it into a powder,”
Brainerd explained. A fermentation
process yields predominately
ethanol and Dried Distillers Grains
(DDG), which is a low-value animal
feed.
“So there’s no germ in those.
There’s no oil and no protein,”
Brainerd said. “At a wet mill what
we are interested in doing is separating
out those four components.
The real value for a wet mill is to
get at that starch so you can make
other products.”
The Clinton plant is notable in
its efforts in the last 10 or 15 years
of looking not just at production
but at the plant itself and how
to manage its waste stream, said
Dean Brainerd
Plant Manager,
ADM Clinton
Kevin Keener,
director of
the Center for
Crops Utilization
Research
(CUR) at Iowa
State University.
CUR is
focused on
new processes,
products, and markets for corn,
soybeans and other Midwest crops.
ADM built a co-generation
plant at the Clinton site in 2008.
That plant uses a combination of
seed corn and coal to produce 100
percent of the steam and electricity
needed to operate the property.
“A lot of energy is consumed in
taking a corn kernel and breaking
it apart,” Keener said. “The process
to separate it into particles is
expansive. Each [corn wet-milling]
facility is a bit unique.”
The Clinton ADM co-generation
plant has state-of-the-art pollution
control equipment, Brainerd said,
and it puts out the amount of energy
equivalent to what would be
used by 100,000 homes. That plant
can burn up to 20 percent biomass.
“It seems pretty innovative,”
Keener said of the co-generation
plant. “They are taking a high
number of waste streams and using
them for that facility. These things
are coming directly out of manufacturing.
They are taking them
from the back door and back in
through the front door.”
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 31

STICKLEY
ELECTRIC
THE RIGHT
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NEEDS
ADM also has a bioprocessing
plant in Clinton
that began operating
in 2010. It takes dextrose
from the wet mill and
makes it into marketable
materials. The plant has
700,000 gallons of fermentation
capacity that
uses microbes to convert
dextrose syrup into valuable
products.
In 2009, Brainerd said,
it was commissioned for
production of biodegradable
plastics.
KERNELS OF COMMERCE
“Currently, the plant is
being repurposed and is
producing enzymes for
the ethanol industry and
algal oils for animal feed
and human food products,”
he said.
Keener said those
efforts are laudable.
“They are taking
low-value products
and developing them
into new types of feed,
fuels and biopolymer,”
he said. “They are adding
value.” n
Stickley
Electric
Service, Inc.
563-652-2439
Fax: (563) 652-2430
113 Western Ave.,
Maquoketa, IA
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
The ADM plant in Clinton uses a wet-milling process to make corn
products. It employs 750 people and uses corn from local farmers.
32 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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By KRISTINE A. TIDGREN
Staff Attorney
Center for Agricultural Law & Taxation
Iowa State University
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Iowa has a new law impacting family
members who wish to partition or divide
commonly owned parcels of land. Effective
July 1, 2018, a new procedure for
“heirs property” makes it much less likely
that a tenant in common who does not want to
sell the family farm will be forced to do so. For
many of these properties, a buyout or partition in
kind will now be the favored disposition.
A tenancy in common is created when more
than one person is given an ownership interest
in a parcel of property. In other words, if a father
gifts a 180-acre parcel of farmland to his four
children, they will become tenants in common,
each owning a 25 percent undivided interest in
the whole. They each have the right to possess
the entire parcel, but all tenants in common must
agree before they can sell or lease the property.
This ownership arrangement often leads to
disputes. In many cases, one or more cotenants
wish to sell and one or more cotenants wish to
hold on to the property, often for sentimental
reasons. A partition action allows a tenant in
common to go to court to seek a sale or equitable
division of the property.
Iowa’s partition law, as it applies to family
farms, has been in the spotlight since the end of
2016, when the Iowa Supreme Court decided
Newhall v. Roll, 888 N.W.2d 636 (Iowa 2016).
This opinion illustrated that—unlike most other
states—Iowa was “unequivocal in favoring partition
by sale.” This meant that if one tenant in
common demanded a division of jointly owned
property, the property would usually be sold
and the proceeds divided. A partition in kind, in
contrast, is where the court does not order the
property to be sold, but divides it into separate
parcels corresponding to the ownership interests
New procedures
for dividing
‘heirs property’
in effect
of the tenants in common. To obtain a partition
in kind, a tenant in common had to prove that
such division would be both “equitable and
practicable.” This proved to be a lofty standard.
The Newhall case involved two siblings who
inherited family land as tenants in common.
The land included two separate tracts in separate
counties. The brother sought a partition
by sale of both tracts, and the sister—arguing a
sentimental attachment to the “home place”—
requested a partition in kind. The Iowa Supreme
Court agreed with the district court that
the sister was unable to show that a physical
division of the properties would be “equitable
and practicable.” The tax bases of the properties
were different, and the “home place” tract was
worth more than the other tract. The Court also
found that Iowa law did not allow for “owelty,”
a cash payment to make a partition in kind
division fairer. As such, the Court ruled that
the property could not be equitably divided. In
January of this year, the Court again disallowed
a partition in kind of a family farm in Wihlm v.
Campbell, No. 15–0011 (Iowa 2018). In Wihlm,
the court of appeals had allowed the partition in
kind. The Supreme Court, however, reinstated
the district court opinion which had held that the
sister failed to prove that the partition in kind
would be “equitable and practicable” because
“the volatile nature of farmland as affected by
the crop prices has made a partition in kind
merely guesswork when factoring in the nature
and qualities of the land.”
Understanding that family properties—family
farms in particular—often present non-economic,
sentimental circumstances that should be
factored into the equation, the Iowa Legislature
stepped in.
The new law, SF 2175, begins with the same
premise as past law: Partition is to be an equitable
proceeding, and partition by sale is to be the
default unless a court determines (in response to
a request by one of the parties) that partition in
About
CALT:
n The Center for
Agricultural Law and
Taxation (CALT)
at Iowa State
University was
created in 2006.
It provides timely,
critically objective
information to
producers,
professionals and
agribusinesses
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Contact CALT:
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University
2321 N. Loop,
Suite 200
Ames, IA 50010
Phone:
(515) 294-5217
Fax: (515) 294-0700
www.calt.iastate.edu
34 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

kind is “equitable and practicable.” The
new law, however, completely overhauls
partition actions involving “heirs
property.”
As long as there is not a recorded
agreement governing a partition of the
property, real property held in tenancy
in common will be classified as “heirs
property” if at least one of the owners
received the property from a relative and
(1) at least 20 percent of the interests are
held by relatives, (2) at least 20 percent
of the interests are held by an individual
who acquired title from a relative, or (3)
at least 20 percent or more of the cotenants
are relatives.
The law defines “relative” very broadly
to include even distant cousins related to
the owners through common great-grandparents.
If one party requests a partition in kind
of heirs property, the court will allow the
tenants in common who want a partition
in kind an opportunity to buy out
the ownership interests of the tenants in
common who want to sell the land. The
price for such buyout will be established
by the court based upon an appraisal and
a hearing.
If a buyout does not occur, the court
will order the heirs property to be equitably
divided through a partition in kind
unless it determines that partition in kind
will result in great prejudice to the cotenants
as a group. The factors the court
will consider include:
• Whether the property can be practicably
divided.
• Whether a partition in kind will
apportion the property in such a way that
the fair market value of the parcels resulting
from the division will be materially
less than the value of the property if the
property is sold as a whole
• Evidence of the collective duration
of ownership or possession of the
property by a cotenant and one or more
predecessors who are relatives
• A cotenant’s sentimental attachment
to the property
• The degree to which a cotenant has
contributed the property taxes, insurance,
and other expenses associated with maintaining
the property.
• Tax consequences
• Any other factors the court deems
relevant
If the court determines that no great
prejudice will result to the cotenants as
a group as a result of a partition in kind,
the court will order such a division. The
new law also allows for the possibility of
an owelty payment, which is money paid
to a cotenant receiving a less valuable
parcel through a partition in kind. Owelty
can be useful to make a division more
equitable.
If the court finds that great prejudice
would result to the group as a result of a
partition in kind, it will order a partition
by sale.
This extensive rewrite of the partition
law will certainly change the way family
property is divided in Iowa. It may also
result in more settlements and fewer
court proceedings regarding heirs property
once parties understand that a partition
by sale is unlikely. There will no doubt
be some bumps as the law is implemented,
but this change appears welcome for
those wanting to keep the farm in the
family. In such cases, however, careful
transition planning—rather than relying
on a statutory remedy—remains the best
option for establishing long-term property
ownership and avoiding future family
litigation. n
The way you farm has changed over the years...
How our pharmacy operates has changed, too.
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(Below) Tammy Bullock, Angie Spannagel,
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 35

We owe our success to your success.
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100
HAPPY
th
Jackson County Farm Bureau celebrates
a century, along with state organization
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
At the Iowa Farm Bureau
headquarters in
Des Moines, there’s a
black-and-white picture
hanging on the
wall outside of the board room.
Joe Heinrich, the bureau’s vice
president who hails from Maquoketa,
notices it every time he’s
there.
It shows cars parked on the
street and people walking into
the first annual meeting of the
organization some 100 years ago.
“So it’s January in Iowa —
1919. You think about all these
farmers coming together. You think of
the road conditions they would have
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
Pictured above is the Farm Bureau booth at the 1960 county fair.
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 37

FARM BUREAU ANNIVERSARY
been dealing with 100 years ago.
You think of the cars. A lot of
those had canvas tops and no heaters.
People were coming from all
over the state because they knew
the importance of organizing and
having a voice for agriculture as
it moved into the modern age of
production,” he said at the annual
meeting of the Jackson County
Farm Bureau in August.
The event at the Offshore Event
Centre in Bellevue, packed with
more than 300 people, also marked
the 100th anniversary celebration
for the organization, which shares
its founding year, 1918, with the
state organization and several bureaus
across Iowa, including neighboring
Dubuque County.
When Farm Bureau began, the
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Joe Heinrich, a Maquoketa farmer who is
also the state vice president of the Farm
Bureau, said the 100-year organization gives
agriculture a voice.
ag industry was moving out of the
pioneer days, away from horsedrawn
plows and into an era where
working together in an organized
way was crucial.
“It was vital that agriculture had
a voice back then,” Heinrich said
of those early leaders. “They had
no idea exactly where it was all
going to go, but they knew that
vision was there.”
A century later, the grassroots,
member-run organization is still
advocating for farmers, lobbying
on issues such as tariffs and
ethanol, among others, and creating
community through a variety
of involvement. For example, the
Jackson County Farm Bureau
sponsors a Farm Safety course
each year, kids’ games at the county
fair, and the annual lunch on the
dairy farm. It also has members
on various civic committees and
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Cole and Ted are pictured by
a 1966 Ford 3000 tractor that
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restored and passed down
through the family. The Ford
is still working daily on the
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FARM BUREAU ANNIVERSARY
Tony Portz
Leland Lane
made donations this year to
Parks to People, the Jackson
County STEM program and
new agriculture buildings
for both FFA and the extension
office, as well as to
wildfire relief for friends in
Kansas and Oklahoma, to
name a few.
Leland Lane, who was the
county president in 1976-77,
said he recalled working on
several issues important to
farmers.
“We worked on a lot of
things,” said Lane, who still
farms. He said it was valuable
to connect with other
farmers who were in the
trenches raising hogs and
cattle and growing grain.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Wanda Cornelius started the Jackson Township branch of the Farm Bureau
women’s group, which provided much fellowship for rural farmers.
Those farming obligations
also made serving on the
Farm Bureau board a big
commitment.
“We were all in it together.
People gave their time
because it’s a good organization,”
he said.
Wanda Cornelius started
the Jackson Township
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FARM BUREAU ANNIVERSARY
branch of the bureau’s women’s
group in the 1970s.
“When we got the homemaker
group together, oh what fun we
had,” said Cornelius, whose husband
Jerry was a county bureau
president in
1970-71. “It
was the most
active group in
the county.”
One of the
high points was
sponsoring a
Rural Women’s
Paul Carstensen
Day that drew
more than 250
people. They also made hospital
sewing kits and hosted themed
dinners.
“Farm Bureau has always been
strong here. It’s
good people. They
had the foresight to
get younger men and
women involved,”
she said.
One of those younger
people is Tony
Portz, who was president
of the county organization
in 2014-15. He
grew up in Maquoketa
and enjoyed participating
in FFA while helping on
the family farm.
“Farm Bureau is everything.
It’s a voice for the
farmer. Nobody else has
that kind of voice,” he said.
Paul Carstensen became
president of the county bureau
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FARM BUREAU ANNIVERSARY
Gary Battles
during the farm
crisis in 1985-86.
“It was a hard
time in farming,
and a lot of people
left (the industry),”
he said. “It
was trying times.”
The organization
worked hard
to lobby Congress,
he said,
“and keep them
informed of our
position.”
“I met a lot of
good people,” he
said.
Generations of
farmers mingled at the recent
event, some of the oldest
members logging in almost 70
years and some of the youngest
still toddling.
“That is a milestone when
you think about it,” Heinrich
said. “One hundred years.
When you think about the
changes that members have
seen over the years, it’s pretty
exciting. I think of my dad
and grandpa. What would
they think about tractors driving
themselves across fields?
Cows milking themselves? It’s
crazy when you think about
everything that we are able to
do today. And when I think
about it and see the kids out
here – where’s it going to be
50 years from now? It’s scary,
but it’s really exciting.” n
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RIVER VALLEY
Embarking on
a new chapter
Tom Leiting joined River Valley Coop in
1987. He retired as chief executive officer
and manager earlier this year. He credits
the company’s growth over the last 30
years to the coop’s member-owners and
board of directors.
Tom Leiting retires from River Valley Coop
after more than 30 years in the agriculture
business, crediting success to member-owners
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
From a young age, Tom Leiting had a front-row seat to farm
life.
“I milked cows from fourth grade until the day I went off to
college,” said Leiting, who is the middle of 10 children who
grew up on a grain and livestock farm in western Iowa.
That early agriculture experience served him well in his more than
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
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44 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

RIVER VALLEY
30 years with Eldridge-based River
Valley Cooperative, where he
retired as the chief executive
officer and manager in June.
As he embarks on a new chapter
in life after decades of knowing
exactly where he was going to be
each Monday morning, he’s looking
forward to a few things: Travel
(he and his wife went to Ireland in
September), a few volunteer efforts
(he’s passionate about the River
Bend Foodbank in the Quad Cities),
and spending time with grandchildren.
He’s also helping with the transition
to new leadership at River
Valley. Tim Burress took over the
helm in May after serving as vice
president and chief financial officer
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RIVER VALLEY
“We’ve been
fortunate to be
located where we
are in the heart
of the corn and
soybean belt with
very productive,
financially stable
family farming
operations.”
— TOM LEITING
for River Valley for eight years.
“He’s been my mentor,” Burress
said of Leiting. “He’s been a great
coach to me. Tom has the ability to talk
about all realms of our business. I’ve
worked with a lot of great leaders, and
Tom is unique because he has such a
broad knowledge and understanding of
things.”
When Leiting joined the company in
1987, it had annual sales of $15 million,
22 employees, and operations in
three communities. At the end of the
current fiscal year in June, the company
had annual sales of more than $420
million, 260 full-time employees, and
operations in more than 20 communities.
Leiting credits that growth to the
coop’s member-owners and board of
directors.
“If you look at the success over the
30 years, it has been driven by our
member-owners,” he said.
A conversation with Leiting about
River Valley’s history puts the farming
industry in Iowa into perspective from
the early 20th Century.
The coop’s oldest partner, Farmers
Cooperative Elevator in Walcott,
opened for business in 1906, at a time
when farming was done with horses, he
noted.
“River Valley and its growth is a
direct reflection of what’s changed on
the farm. We’ve been fortunate to be
located where we are in the heart of
the corn and soybean belt with very
productive, financially stable family
farming operations,” he said.
He traces several key phases through
the past century that have brought the
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 47

RIVER VALLEY
company to where it is today.
“When we started moving from
horse agriculture to mechanized
tractors it allowed farmers to start
to farm more ground and become
more efficient,” he said.
The next step in the 1940s saw
the advent of hybrid seed and
operators capturing more value by
increased productivity on the farm.
Commercial crop nutrients, pest
control and chemical application
evolved in the late 1950s and early
1960s.
“The next phase you saw happening
was the movement toward
use of technology on the farm in
the mid-’90s, and that really hit full
throttle three years ago,” he said,
paving the way for today, where
software use and data storage have
Tim Burress
Chief Executive Officer
and Manager,
River Valley Coop
made information
easier
to access and
transferable,
allowing farmers
to use it to
make decisions.
“Each one of
those steps has
changed how
farms operate,”
Leiting said,
and he made it
his job for many years to keep his
finger on the pulse of the industry
so River Valley could change and
grow with its customers.
After graduating from Iowa
State University with a degree in
agri-business, Leiting did a twoyear
stint in wholesale feed sales
with what was then Land O’Lakes,
followed by eight years at Swiss
Valley Farms for what became
Innovative Ag Services. He welcomed
the chance to come to
Eastern Iowa for the job, with the
added bonus that his wife is from
Jones County.
With more than 2,700 farming
entities in Eastern Iowa and Western
Illinois having an ownership
stake in River Valley, Leiting said
through the years, the company
has focused on developing talent
and keeping a profitable and strong
balance sheet.
“Our current and past board
members take the position of
looking at what are the future
needs of member-owners and how
to position River Valley for that
Our grandpa Jeff and his friend Louie
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48 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

future,” he said. “The other key part
of their thought process is that for a
company that has been in business for
100 years, we have served multiple
generations of the same farms. In order
to do that in the future, it’s really
important that the company is based
on a strong financial footprint.”
That also has helped the coop maintain
a level of investment that keeps it
on the cutting edge.
Burress said a lot of the credit for
the growth goes to Leiting, who is
always “gracious and humble.”
“He’s a visionary and a deep thinker,”
he said, working to move away from a
traditional approach to being ahead of
the curve in agriculture retail and such
things as marketing and branding.
“He’s built this company over the
last 30 years to where it is today. He’s
RIVER VALLEY
a great teacher. He should have been a
professor,” Burress said with a laugh.
“He’ll jump up to the white board
without a moment’s hesitation.”
Burress noted Leiting’s focus on
developing people, a point which the
retired CEO speaks to. He serves or
has served on several boards and advisory
committees, a practice he feels
is important for others in River Valley.
“I’ve always felt it was important
to spend time developing talent,”
Leiting said. “Part of our leadership
succession strategic plan is to develop
people so they can grow personally as
well as professionally and give them
opportunities.”
And as he turns over the reins,
Leiting’s focus on that has served the
company well, Burress said. n
Facts about
River Valley
Cooperative
• River Valley Cooperative
is a farmer-owned and
controlled cooperative
serving more than 2,700
farming operations in
Eastern Iowa and Western
Illinois.
• The parent cooperative
roots go back to 1906
when local farmers pooled
their grain together.
• Today, River Valley
employs 257 full-time
employees, and during
the busy spring and fall
seasons it adds 100 to
125 seasonal, part-time
employees.
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PROUD TO BE NAMED
2018 JACKSON COUNTY FAIR FAMILY
Standing beside countless other volunteers year after year, three generations of the Franzen Family
represent what it takes to come together to create a fair everyone will enjoy. From the fair parade kickoff
until the last stall is cleaned, the whole Franzen family is on the grounds supporting area county fairs.
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Why Farmers
From left to right, Gibson, Kegan, Jana, Alicia, Brian, Jackie, Wylie, Cassie, and Carol Miller
stand in a soybean field near one of the locations their extended family farms.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
For six generations, the Miller family
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
When Kegan Miller
was in grade school,
he loved working
on the family farm.
In the summers, he’d climb onto
a tractor with his grandpa, dad or
uncle and go all day. During the
school year, he did chores morning
and evening.
“I’d get off the bus, and I’d be
feeding bottle calves,” he recalled.
The responsibilities grew as he got
older, and now it’s a full-time job.
Today, Kegan, who is 31, works
with his father, Mark Miller, and
his uncle, Brian Miller, raising
crops, beef cattle and dairy cows.
He is among the sixth generation
of the Miller family to farm fulltime.
Others of his generation and
older still live on family property

Matter
Aside
from producing the meats
and grains that feed the planet,
farmers are the economic backbone
of almost everything in Eastern
Iowa. Our communities — including
churches, schools, and main streets
— are all dependent on those who
plant the seeds.
has cultivated a legacy of farming
and help as they can or when
needed. While the operation has
expanded from its beginnings
decades ago, it still includes the
original Miller homestead north of
Maquoketa.
The Millers are among the
thousands of farmers in Eastern
Iowa who contribute to the legacy
of those who came before them,
working the ground, raising animals
and forming the backbone of
communities west of the banks of
the Mississippi River. They farm
to feed their families. They farm to
provide food for the world. They
farm because they believe in the
value of hard work and caring for
the land. They know they are intertwined
with the economies of the
towns — small and large — that
built up in rural areas over the last
two centuries.

WHY FARMERS MATTER
And today, as much
as ever, the Millers and
countless other farmers
like them remain the
driving force behind the
economic strength and
social fabric of Eastern
Iowa.
On a breezy early evening
in August, several
members of the Miller
family gather on the back
patio of the home of
Brian and Carol Miller,
which is surrounded by
bean fields this year and
overlooks a pasture full
of horses and a barnyard
of cattle. Over cold glasses
of pink lemonade, they
talk about what farming
“Agriculture is one
of the last raw
commodities in this
country. It comes
down to food.”
— BRIAN MILLER
means to them.
“It’s a way of life,” said
Brian, who along with
his brother and father
weathered many rough
times in the industry —
18 percent interest rates,
plummeting commodity
prices, too much rain, not
enough rain. But they see
the value in what they do.
“Agriculture is one of
the last raw commodities
in this country. It comes
down to food,” Brian
said.
Added Keegan, “We
can feed the world.”
Cassie Miller, who is
Brian’s daughter, won’t
make a career on the
farm, but she’ll be using
her farming background.
She’ll be student teaching
in the FFA program
at Maquoketa High
School this fall and plans
to continue in that field
after she graduates from
the University of Wisconsin–Platteville.
“Because I grew up
on a farm, I have a lot to
share when I teach kids,”
said Cassie, 21, who
lives in her great-grandpa’s
farmhouse. One of
the things that she values
is the amount of time you
get to spend with family
when you farm together.
She remembered how she
loved to ride in the combine
and do other chores.
Cassie, Kegan and
their siblings and cousins
all worked on the
farm, making square
bales, feeding calves,
helping with the milking,
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
performing chores — albeit with
more modern equipment — as
their ancestors did before them.
Farming families like the Millers
and thousands of others across
Eastern Iowa are the lifeblood of
the economy.
“Agriculture is absolutely critical
to Iowa’s success as a state,”
said Mike Naig, Iowa’s secretary
of agriculture and land stewardship.
He made his remarks in an
interview earlier this year when
visiting Clinton County.
“Agriculture is the foundation
that our state’s economy is built
on. It’s the health of our economy
as a state. It’s the health of our
local communities as well. It’s
not just the impact on a farmer or
a farm. It’s all of the entities that
Mike Naig
Iowa Secretary of
Agriculture and Land
Stewardship
surround that
farm and the
communities
that surround
it. That’s really
talking about
some pretty
foundational
things to what
Iowa is culturally
and economically.”
In Eastern
Iowa, some 20 percent of the
workforce is employed in agriculture
or an ag-related industry,
based on census data from 2012,
the most recent available. In
Clinton and Jackson counties, as
well as Cedar, Dubuque and Jones,
agriculture accounts for more than
20,500 jobs, $1.1 million in wages,
and $7.6 million in sales. (See box
for by-county information)
Iowa ranks No. 1 in production of
hogs, corn, and eggs and second in
soybeans – while ranking in the top
5 for red meat production, number
of farms, cattle on feed, cash receipts
and total value of ag exports.
“Farming matters economically
across the state of Iowa, period,”
said David Swenson, associate
scientist in the Department of Economics
in the College of Agriculture
at Iowa State University.
The impact is seen in three ways
— services and supplies farmers
need, value-added processes and
buying power.
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
“Every single farm out there has
to borrow money so they need
banks. They buy seed and chemicals
so they
need suppliers.
They have to
buy fuel. There
are specific
services they
need,” Swenson
said.
David Swenson
Associate Scientist,
Department of
Economics
College of Agriculture
Iowa State University
“That’s baked
into every single
economy.
Every farmer
out there has to
do that every
year. They always buy fuel, they
always go to the bank, they always
buy insurance. That’s set.
“Then we can go downstream,”
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
Seated front and center amongst their children, grandchildren and great grandchildren are
Janet and Dave Miller, whose ancestors began farming in Jackson County decades ago.
he said, looking at what businesses
exist because of the agriculture
industry. Businesses involving
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
in Clinton is one large example,
but there are many
other examples in Eastern
Iowa, he said.
“The third picture is
what happens when farmers
get a good return on
farming. For a few years
early in this decade, farmers
got historic returns.
What did they do with
the money? They pumped
those profits back into the
regional economy. They
bought houses, vehicles,
machinery,” he said.
The average size of a
farm in Jackson County
is 246 acres, noted Nic
Hockenberry, director of
Total Number
of Farms
Cedar: 955
Clinton: 1,244
Dubuque: 1,462
Jackson: 1,255
Jones: 1,061
Total farm
land in acres
Cedar: 312,457
Clinton: 417,189
Dubuque: 291,441
Jackson: 308,956
Jones: 314,005
Percent of all
jobs from crop
production
Cedar: 12.9
Clinton: 17.7
Dubuque: 2.3
Jackson: 11.2
Jones: 13.5
COUNTY
FARM STATS
Cedar, Clinton, Dubuque,
Jackson and Jones counties
contibute to the farming industry
Percent of workforce employed in
agriculture and related industries
Cedar: 23
Clinton: 29.8
Agriculture
total sales
Cedar: $505 million
Clinton: $4.9 billion
Dubuque: $1.3 billion
Jackson: $484 million
Jones: $417 million
Dubuque: 7.3
Jackson: 23.6
Jones: 19.6
Agriculture
wages
Cedar: $144 million
Clinton: $524 million
Dubuque: $240 million
Jackson: $100 million
Jones: $112 million
*Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture Census of Agriculture 2012
Market value of
livestock sold
Cedar: $97 million
Clinton: $113 million
Dubuque: $268 million
Jackson: $129 million
Jones: $112 million
Market value
of crops grown
Cedar: $219 million
Clinton: $269 million
Dubuque: $120 million
Jackson: $108 million
Jones: $165 million
Percent of jobs
from livestock
production
Cedar: 6.7
Clinton: 1.7
Dubuque: 3.4
Jackson: 6.9
Jones: 4.7
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
the Jackson County Economic Alliance.
In Clinton, that number is 335
acres.
Eastern Iowa doesn’t have the large
corporate farms that are found in Iowa
to the west, he said.
“That colors our region’s farmers in
that they are more tied to the community,”
he said.
Eastern Iowa is not only demographically
rural, it’s culturally rural, he said.
“Whether you live on a farm or not,
you identify with that type of life,”
he said, noting such characteristics as
self-reliance, deriving identity from the
land, hard-won success and work ethic.
“Farmers equal a culture of forging
their own paths,” Hockenberry said.
“Iowa farmers take pride in the fact
that they are the producers of food for
the world.” n
Rural
entrepreneur
In sharing its story and expanding
its business, Moore Family Farms
advocates for agriculture
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
On a sunny July morning, some 20 kids ran around
the front yard of the neat white farmhouse at
Moore Family Farms outside of Maquoketa. A
calf born just hours before laid serenely in the
grass, having not yet taken her first steps.
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58 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Heather
Moore
Maquoketa
Heather Moore reads
to a group of children
who visited her farm in
July for the first-ever
story hour. She shared
two stories: “Charlie
and the New Baby” by
Rhea Drummond and
“I Know a Wee Piggy”
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
A gray and white goat on a red leash
joined the party while the family’s
Great Pyrenees dog, Signe, frolicked
around.
“There’s a goat!” one child exclaimed.
“This petting zoo is pretty awesome,”
said another, while a girl who
crouched down to pet the calf told her
mother, “This just got born!”
The kids were visiting the farm for
the first-ever story hour, which Heather
Moore conceived to give local
children and their families a glimpse
into farm life, complete with a chance
to meet a few animals and tour the operation
that includes a dairy barn.
“The tours are a fun way to get the
kids on the farm and see what we do
here,” Moore said. She’s planning to
host similar events in the future.
Graham Kroger,
6, of Dubuque,
was ready for a
day at the farm
with his cowboy
boots.
EASTERN IOWA
FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
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60 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
It’s just one of the many ways she
shares the farming lifestyle with other
people. She believes in supporting the
local agriculture industry by providing
information to the public and making
the connection between what we eat
each day and where it originates. She’s
also focused on taking good care of
animals by providing them with a nutritious
diet and healthy living conditions.
A major focus of her message is on
buying local, an effort that she’s immersed
herself in during the last year.
In addition to running the farm with
her husband, Brandon Moore, she
operates The Kitchen at Moore Family
Farms, a shop that sells cheese made
from milk from her dairy cows and
other locally produced foods and handmade
crafts in downtown Maquoketa.
The store, at 204 S. Main St., started
out in winter of 2017 as a holiday shop
that Moore expected to keep open seasonally.
She and Brandon were looking
for a way to create a value-added,
sustainable market for their milk. While
they dream of opening a creamery —
an expensive undertaking — for the
time being they found one in Wisconsin
that processes their milk into cheddar
cheese and cheese curds.
A strong business that first season —
they sold out of their first 700 pounds
of cheese before Christmas — and
the availability of the space prompted
her to decide to keep the shop open
year-round and expand its offerings
to include hand-dipped ice cream and
daily lunch specials. Everything sold in
the store — from peanut butter, honey,
“We’re a rural
county, so it’s
important to us
that we’re tipping
our hat to the rural
community.”
— NICOLAS HOCKENBERRY
Director, Jackson County
Economic Alliance
—— Clinton County Democrats ——
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
soap, meat, bread, wood carvings
and more — is produced within
100 miles of Maquoketa.
“I don’t think of myself as an
(agriculture) advocate,” Moore
said as she recently worked in the
shop stocking more cheese into the
refrigerated case. “I’m just telling
my story of our farm.”
Heather and Brandon live on
their rural Maquoketa farm with
their three sons, Tucker, 8, Cassidy,
5, and Cooper, 2. Aside from
the 50 dairy cows Heather manages,
they also have 800 head of beef
cattle that Brandon oversees.
Moore grew up on a small dairy
farm in Wisconsin and exhibited
dairy cattle at the county fair.
When she turned 10, the family
moved off the farm, but she
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Lilly Kroger, 8, of Dubuque, visits with a calf at
Moore Family Farms. Children who attended
story hour also took a tour of the barn.
continued to show cattle. Brandon
grew up on a Jackson County farm
with sheep, pigs and beef cows.
They understand the importance
of small farmers and why they
matter.
“The most rudimentary reason is
obviously food,” Moore said. But
she also knows their farm contributes
to the local economy. She
cited dairy industry information
that estimates that for every 10
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
cows, one full-time job is created
between vet calls, feed costs and
other services that support a farm
operation.
“Our small [dairy] farm generates
enough economic activity for
six jobs,” Moore said.
And the shop adds value to the
downtown. That contribution
was recognized when the Moores
recently were recognized by the
Iowa Farm Bureau with its Renew
Rural Iowa (RRI) Entrepreneur
Award.
RRI is an Iowa Farm Bureau
Federation (IFBF) initiative supporting
new and existing businesses
through education, mentoring,
and financial resources. Since its
inception, RRI has helped create
$125 million in economic impact
for rural communities.
Sandy Ehrig,
economic development
administrator
for
the federation,
said people like
Nicolas
the Moores are
Hockenberry the engines that
Director,
Jackson County are helping fuel
Economic Alliance rural communities.
“There are a lot of entrepreneurial
families in Iowa,” she said, citing
the Moores as an example. Her
office is working to get their stories
out.
Nicolas Hockenberry, director
of the Jackson County Economic
Alliance, also noted the impact the
Moores have had on the community.
“We’re a rural county, so it’s
important to us that we’re tipping
our hat to the rural community,” he
said.
“We love to see businesses like
this in our small towns that highlight
products that are for tourists
and residents alike.”
When Moore moved to Iowa in
2009, she brought two heifers with
her, and their descendants were
the first cows to step foot into the
dairy barn she and Brandon began
operating in 2014.
In farming, she said, “there are
no guarantees.” But she and Brandon
are committed to continuing
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 63

WHY FARMERS MATTER
to share their story and looking for
opportunities to promote sustainability
for their farm and for the local
industry.
Heather summed up her feelings
in a brochure called “All in a Day’s
Work,” which explains the evolution
of the family’s dairy operation:
“To me, dairy farming is a dream
come true. I am so blessed to be able
to live my dream every single day,
with my family by my side. I love
that my children are growing up
learning to be kind, compassionate
and responsible from such a young
age. I love the relationship that I develop
with my cows —I love having
the opportunity to help them develop
into their full potential. I love
caring for the cows and producing a
high-quality product.” n
County fair
royalty
Mike Franzen and family dedicate hours
of time to their favorite annual event
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Mike Franzen
can’t recall a
summer when
he didn’t attend
one of his
favorite events.
“I don’t think I’ve ever missed
a fair in Jackson County since
I was a kid,” Franzen said.
“That was our vacation. I don’t
know how much money I spent
on those little cranes that pick
things up. I won a lot of pocket
knives.”
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
Mike
Franzen
Monmouth
Mike Franzen
waves to the
crowd during
the fair parade.
His familiy was
named the 2018
Jackson County
Fair Family.
EASTERN IOWA
FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
farmers in Eastern Iowa
whose personal businesses
come to a halt at fair
time. They are among the
volunteers who literally
make fairs happen
through working on
setup, manning booths,
judging, running shows
and more, said Lanny
Simpson, Jackson County
Fair Board director.
“We could not do what
we do without people
like Mike,” she said.
Growing up on a
farm – he started driving
a tractor at age 6
– Franzen’s early memories
of the fair shaped
his commitment to
the event for decades.
Franzen is a member of
both the Jackson County
and the Wyoming fair
boards. With help from
his family, he heads up
the tractor shows at those
two events, as well as at
the Scott County Fair. In
July, the Franzens crisscross
Eastern Iowa in the
span of three weeks to
show tractors at the fairs,
Jason Zamastil
Wyoming Fair Board President
as well as those in Clinton
and Jones counties.
During fair weeks, he’s
at the fairgrounds from
sunup until sundown,
helping with outside
displays and running
the tractor show, which
has had record-breaking
attendance in Jackson
County the past few
years.
“Mike is the type of
person who is willing to
go the extra mile. He’ll
help anyone out. He’ll
give you the shirt off
his back,” said Jason
Zamastil, the president
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
“He (Franzen)
understands the
value of working
and bringing
agriculture and
entertainment to
the people.”
— LANNY SIMPSON,
JACKSON COUNTY
FAIR MANAGER
of the Wyoming Fair Board who has
known Franzen since he was a kid.
As a kid, he had a front-row seat
watching Franzen on that board. Zamastil
took over the president’s job in
2013.
“A fair takes a lot of volunteer hours
and a lot of work,” he said. “If you
didn’t have dedicated people like Mike,
it wouldn’t happen.”
Simpson said when she was first
hired for the job, she remembered that
Mike and his late wife, Kandy, “were
pretty much the positive force that kept
saying, ‘We can do this,’” she said.
“They really supported the ideas I came
up with and helped.”
She noted that Franzen’s children,
Sheri Dosland, and Chuck and Scott
Franzen, also are very involved.
“They are really a team,” she said.
Lanny Simpson
Jackson County
Fair Manager
In fact, Franzen,
his wife Sandy,
the three Franzen
kids, their spouses,
kids and grandkids
were named this
year’s Fair Family
in Jackson County.
Having been on that
fair board for some
20 years and serving
as president twice, it
was a well-deserved
award, said Judy
Tonderum, who introduced the family
at the Pearson Hall pancake breakfast
that kicked off this year’s fair.
As Franzen and more than 20 family
members sat on the stage Tonderum
talked about their years of dedication.
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
“Mike and family use
their know-how,” she
said, whether it be for the
tractor pull, the garden
tractor show, the pedal
tractor show, stock car
races, antique tractor
show or the Night of
Destruction event.
“I could go on and on,”
she said about their contributions.
“They literally
put the family business
on hold” to dedicate time
to the fair.
“We like fairs and
we love the people. It’s
all about the people,”
Franzen said in accepting
the fair family designation.
“Almost everyone
in Iowa is
connected
to agriculture in
some way.”
— MIKE FRANZEN
“When they talk about
fair people, Mike and
his family are it. They
just plain love fairs. He
understands the value of
working and bringing
agriculture and entertainment
to the people. He
helps show that ag activities
can be fun,” Simpson
said.
Franzen is the owner
of Franzen Family Used
Tractors, Combines
and Parts, and a Mahindra
sales office in
Monmouth, as well as
Highway 64 Auctions in
Baldwin.
Despite the demands of
building three businesses
over the last 40 years,
Franzen has always
found time to volunteer.
“I’ve just always been
that way,” Franzen said.
“I think it’s important.”
He’s spent years on
the Jaycees, a stint on
the Midland School
Board, endless hours on
the Jackson County and
Wyoming fair boards,
running tractor shows at
Jackson County, Wyoming
and Scott County
fairs.
He’s also devoted a lot
of time and resources to
FFA, an organization he
never belonged to.
“I milked cows, fed
hogs and did custom
work. We were too busy
for FFA,” he said of his
high school years. “But
I wish I had been. It’s
so important. We have
so many good kids. You
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70 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
hear so many bad
things in the news.
FFA kids learn so
much, how to handle
speaking engagements,
how to work in
groups.”
He serves as a
mentor and helps
with fundraising for
the Wyoming group,
including its annual
dessert auction each
spring.
“A lot of kids don’t
go to college, and FFA
is so important because
Iowa is number
one in corn, hogs and
chicken eggs. Almost
everyone in Iowa is
connected to agriculture
in some way,”
Franzen said.
While he talks about
stepping back from
some of his volunteer
fair activities, he’s not
about to miss a fair.
And, he’ll likely help
in whatever way he
can.
“I’ve never been
one to sit around,” he
said. “I enjoy being
out and just working.
I like being active.”
Zamastil concurred.
“As long as he’s
able, he’ll do something.
He’s not someone
who is going to sit
around and watch you
work,” he said. But he
did add a warning.
“He’s a practical
jokester, so you have
to be on guard.” n
‘We’re all people’
BY SARA MILLHOUSE
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Farmers here can help fellow
farmers a world away.
That’s the seed that Steve
Witt of Clinton County has
helped plant across eastern
Iowa through his work with the Food
Resource Bank, an international organization
that helps struggling farmers
around the world.
Steve
Witt
Elvira
Clinton County farmer helps
grow hope for farmers a world away
Through his
work with
a global
resource
group,
Steve Witt
is helping
farmers
around the
world make a
better living.
EASTERN
IOWA FARMER
PHOTO /
BROOKE
TAYLOR
“We’re all just people, even if it’s
other parts of the world,” Witt said.
The local effort that started in Elvira
has grown to include “growing
projects” in Preston and Miles and in
Eldridge-Long Grove in Scott County.
Elvira Zion Lutheran Church also
partners with First United Methodist
Church and Prince of Peace in Clinton.
The “growing project” model is
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 71

WHY FARMERS MATTER
“We’re all people
doing what we
can in a small
way. We’re a drop
in the ocean.”
— STEVE WITT
simple: farmers pledge income from
the crops on a certain portion of land
to help farmers in Armenia, Peru or
Burkina Faso. Others help fund the
project by donating cash, seed, chemical
inputs or farmers’ market proceeds.
The donations are significant. The
Elvira project has five acres and donates
about $10,000 annually. The
Long Grove-Eldridge growing project
includes 40 acres, 20 in corn and 20 in
beans. The Preston-Miles community
has donated almost $265,000 to Food
Resource Bank since starting what they
call “Sharing the Harvest.”
It smarts just a little bit to take his
corn to town and not get a check for it,
but “you get over it,” Witt said, thinking
of the Biblical reminder that “whatever
you give, you will receive back
many times over.”
He traveled to the Dominican Republic
to see firsthand how Iowa farmers’
dollars are making a difference. Witt
talks about Haitian workers in the
Dominican Republic forced in debt
slavery and how a Food Resource Bank
project helps a woman who lost her
legs in a hit-and-run accident raise pigs
and make a living. He accompanied the
Food Resource Bank team to medical
check-ups and visited farms that desperately
needed education on drainage.
Now as a member of Food Resource
Bank’s board of directors, Witt says
that their projects require detailed plans
with a discrete timeline and accountability
check-ins to sustain funding for
the full cycle.
Food Resource Bank partners with
organizations already on the ground in
impoverished areas. “The biggest thing
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72 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
is coming in and asking them what they
want,” Witt said. “They might be growing
squash, and they might be plowing
by hand, but do they need tractors? They
might not be ready for tractors because
they don’t have a dealer,” he said.
Food Resource Bank is ecumenical,
which Witt said he appreciates. “We’re all
people, and we’ve all got a common goal,
and let’s get it done,” he said.
Witt knows people need help close to
home, too, but the scale of the need in
poor countries motivates him to continue
with Food Resource Bank. “We’re all people
doing what we can in a small way,” he
said. “We’re a drop in the ocean.”
Witt is occasionally asked why he’s
helping faraway farmers become more
competitive with his neighbors, to which
he gives his sly smile. “Well, you want
to export, too, and dead people don’t buy
anything,” he said. “You have to grow
their lifestyle.”
Over the years, Food Resource Bank
has slowly morphed from providing food
to helping farmers make a better living,
through Extension-like education, water
projects and more. It’s the “teach a man
to fish” model. Or, as Food Resource
Bank writes on their website, “sustainable
food security also means that people have
the knowledge, technology and access
to get the fish necessary for successful
fishing.”
“It’s helping people in third-world countries
become more sustainable,” Witt said.
The organization is in the process of
changing their name to Growing Hope
Worldwide, to better reflect their mission.
“When you grow a crop here, there’s a
lot of hope involved, and there’s a lot of
hope there, too,” Witt said. n
To learn more
about the
organization’s
efforts, visit
foodsresourcebank.org
If you have questions
or would like
to get involved, contact
admin@
foodsresourcebank.org
or call (888) 276-4FRB.
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
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74 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Greenview
Farms
DeWitt
Members of the Greenview
Farms team include, from left,
Dale Ford, Billy Dolan, Kevin
Green, Mike Flammang,
Keith Green, Duane Gannon,
Spencer Paysen, and
Amanda Willimack.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
Ardith Barr has rented
180 acres of her land to
Greenview Farms for
more than two decades.
Over those years,
Greenview employees have sprayed for
weeds and mowed her ditches. They’ve
made sure her fields have proper
drainage and kept her apprised of her
ground’s annual yields. In the winter,
they clear snow so she can get her car
out, and in late summer bags of sweet
corn show up on her doorstep.
Year-in and year-out.
“They are great stewards of the land,”
Barr said. “They treat it like it’s their
own, and they treat me like family.”
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 75

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Two of the core philosophies of
Greenview Farm are taking care of the
land and treating its owners well, said
Kevin Green, chief operating officer.
“We treat land owners like customers
because land is a scarce resource,”
he said. “We care for the land like it’s
our own.”
That includes tree removal, fence
repair and tile drainage. They also do
snow removal and deliver sweet corn
– all part of taking care of the people
who are core to the business. Customer
service, Green said, is paramount.
“Doing the right things gets recognized
by land owners,” he said.
The practices have served the company
well since Green started farming
more than 40 years ago, renting 160
acres in 1976 and
managing a livestock herd. In 1983
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Ardith Barr has rented her land to Greenview Farms for more than two decades. She
appreciates the extra care they give to the land and how they treat her as a land owner.
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76 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
he and his wife, Lori, bought 20 acres
to serve as their operation’s base and
switched to grain. The size of the venture
grew steadily, reaching 6,000 acres
in 2000, doubling to more than 12,000 in
2008, and hitting 13,000 in 2017.
“It was a small farm that had success
and grew,” Green said of his beginnings.
Today he manages 11,500 cash-rented
acres from 70 land owners and 1,500
custom-farmed acres in Cedar, Clinton,
Jackson, Jones, Linn, Muscatine and
Scott counties.
In some cases, those landowners
depend on that cash rent for their retirement.
For others, the income is an
investment for the future to pay for a
grandchild’s education or to have money
set aside to take care of their home. For
some who live out of the area, it allows
them to benefit from the productivity
of land bought and farmed for years by
their ancestors.
Whatever the reason a landowner
chooses to rent his or her ground, the
cash rent model is important to local
economies because it provides income to
people and it keeps the farmland sustainable,
experts said.
“More than half of Iowa’s farmland is
rented, and strong landlord/tenant relationships
are important for the long-term
viability of Iowa’s valuable farmland,”
said Alejandro Plastina, assistant professor
of economics and extension economist
at Iowa State University.
About 16.77 million acres of farmland
(cropland and pastureland) in Iowa
were rented out in 2017, accounting for
more than half of Iowa’s 30.6 million
acres of agricultural land base across the
“More than half of
Iowa’s farmland
is rented,
and strong
landlord/tenant
relationships are
important for
the long-term
viability of
Iowa’s valuable
farmland.”
— ALEJANDRO PLASTINA,
IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
state, according to the 2017 Iowa
Farmland Ownership and Tenure
Survey published by Iowa State
University’s Extension and Outreach.
ISU’s 2017 Farmland Lease
Annual Report noted that “communication
is a key challenge for
all farmland owners and producers.”
The report also found that
farmland owners want to know
how their land is being farmed and
what it is producing.
In that regard, Greenview has
been ahead of the curve for years.
Green believes a key to his
growth is his beliefs on how
to work with his partners. That
includes a monthly information
meeting where he and his team
talk with landowners about topics
related to agriculture like property
taxes or commodity prices, for example.
They also take that opportunity
to listen to the landowners
with whom they work.
“I hardly ever miss one,” Barr
said. “I really appreciate those. I
was born and raised on a farm. We
get updated on the markets, new
technology and that kind of thing.
Kevin goes to seminars and he
knows what’s happening. He keeps
us all well-connected with what’s
going on.”
At the end of the season, the
company also holds a thank-you
banquet and issues an annual report.
Landlords get a booklet that
shows them how their farm did in
terms of yields, fertilizer, etc.
“It’s very informative,” Barr
Alejandro Plastina
Assistant Professor
of Economics and
Extension Economist,
Iowa State University
said. “Having
been a farmer,
I find it so
interesting, and
it keeps me
connected.”
In 1996 Barr
and her husband
were so
busy with their
snowmobile,
ATV and watercraft
business,
that they knew they needed to
downscale their farming.
“We kept farming the ground we
were renting, and we decided to
rent the ground we own,” she said.
That’s how she became connected
to Greenview. She recalled one
Christmas when they came out and
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78 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
plowed snow four different times
on Christmas Eve and Christmas
Day because they knew she had
large family gatherings planned.
Green graduated from the University
of Iowa with a business
degree before venturing out on his
own as he grew up on a small farm
that didn’t have room for him. Experience
has been his best teacher.
“I learned through my mistakes,”
he said. He also noted that much of
how Greenview Farms operates and
builds relationships with its partners
are universal best practices.
“None of what we do is original
to us,” he said. “We just do what
other commercial businesses do.”
Those efforts have earned some
notices. In 1996 the farm was
named Best Managed Farm in
Farm Futures magazine. In 2004
Kevin was a finalist for the “Top
Producer of the Year” award by
Farm Journal media. In addition,
his operation is often a stop for
organized visits from farmers from
other states and such countries as
Austria, Brazil and Canada.
While Lori retired from keeping
office hours in 2015, the Green’s
children, Katie and Adam, as well
as Kevin’s brother Keith Green
are in the partnership. They also
employ three full-time, part-time
and seasonal people.
The business model isn’t traditional
in that Greenview doesn’t do
every single facet, such as spraying,
trucking, grain drying, etc.
That’s one way his business
supports the local economy. It also
does in smaller ways, such as when
the crews are in the fields and they
order lunch for them each day from
a different local restaurant.
Green rents his land from retired
farmers and people – some outof-state
– who either inherited it
or bought it as an investment. For
them and people like Barr, the land
is an important income source.
Green doesn’t take that responsibility
lightly.
“Our duty is to make a profit to
be able to pay to landowners. Our
duty is to produce as much as we
can,” he said.
And he’s delivered on that, Barr
said, as well as cultivated “a great
relationship. This is my retirement.
My rent is my retirement. I know
I’m in good hands. n
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 79

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Mike
Cozzolino
and Heidi
Passig
prepare
food for
a busy
lunchtime
crowd at
Buzzy’s
in Welton,
which is
frequented
by many
farmers
and ag
workers.
EASTERN
IOWA
FARMER
PHOTOS /
TREVIS
MAYFIELD
Driving the economy
Farmers impact main street
by supporting local merchants
Jay Irwin of Kriegers says farmers drive
a lot of business whether it’s buying
new vehicles or having repairs done.
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Buzzy Wiese is busy on
a recent Wednesday
afternoon, as business
is booming at his namesake
bar/restaurant just
off Highway 61 in Welton. There’s an
agriculture presentation going on in
the banquet room for 75 people who
also are eating lunch. The regular
dining room is full and only one seat
is left at the bar.
“This is the small-town farming
community here,” Wiese said, gesturing
to the patrons enjoying burgers,
shrimp baskets or a plate of ham and
cheesy mashed potatoes.
“It’s nothing fancy, but it’s good
food, and farm people have to have
reasonable prices,” he said with a
grin.
From a farming background himself,
Wiese started the business in
80 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Buzzy Wiese takes a break in the action to talk
about the support his business has enjoyed from
the ag industry.
1985. He added the banquet room in
1991. It’s often booked several times a
week for large-group presentations by
ag-related organizations – seed vendors,
extension officers, conservation
professionals, and financial advisors
– who like the central location and the
option to offer attendees a hot meal
along with their information.
“That really keeps things afloat,”
Wiese said of the meetings.
His restaurant is one of the hundreds
of businesses in Eastern Iowa that
Alicia Miller pours a glass of wine
at Farmers Creek Antiques and
Mac’s Wine Cellar in Maquoketa.
Owner Sue Mayberry (left)
named the shop after the location
of the family’s home farm.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
depend on the farming
community for support
— from drugstores to
appliance sellers, from
gift shops to car dealerships,
from repair garages
to hardware stores,
from restaurants to gas
stations.
“All the retail trade
merchants, whether it’s
a fencing vendor, implement
dealer, or downtown
store, they are all
tied closely with agriculture,
and whether or not
farmers are successful
will impact them,” said
Nic Hockenberry, director
of the Jackson County
Economic Alliance. With
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Lisa Duffy, owner of Meant To Be With Flowers, grew up on a dairy
farm. She said farmers are “the heart of the community.”
more than 20 percent
of the local workforce
employed in agriculture
or related industries and
hundreds of millions of
dollars in wages paid,
farmers are a big cog
in the local economy’s
wheel.
“Farmers are using
their wealth to impact the
vibrancy of Main Street,”
Hockenberry said, referring
to that buying power
and to farm families who
operate businesses outside
the farm.
Sue Mayberry is the
proprietor of Farmers
Creek Antiques and
Mac’s Wine Cellar at 144
S. Main St. in Maquoketa.
The store’s namesake,
Farmers Creek, is the
township where the Mayberry
family’s home farm
is located.
“We chose that name
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82 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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WHY FARMERS MATTER
“We very much
appreciate what they
do. Farming is our
roots, and we
all understand that
in our state, this is
a primary driver.”
— LINDA SNYDER,
OWNER
THE CROSSROADS INSPIRED
LIVING & GARDEN CAFÉ
out of respect for our farming community,”
said Mayberry, who along with
her husband Jim, also owns Mayberry
Appliance in Maquoketa. The family
still farms, and she knows the value
farmers bring to the community.
“We really depend on their patronage
to make our businesses run,” she
said. The appliance store has been in
Maquoketa for 38 years, and many
farmers shop there.
“Farm families are home more than
other people. They do a lot of cooking
and a lot of laundry,” she said.
Lisa Duffy is partial to the farming
lifestyle having grown up on a dairy
farm in northeastern Wisconsin. As a
business owner in DeWitt, she counts
many farming families among her
clientele at Meant To Be With Flowers,
810 Sixth Ave.
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“If we didn’t have the
farmers, I don’t know
if we’d be here.”
“Farm people
know how to work
hard. They’re the
heart of the community
basically,”
she said, adding that
she enjoys visiting
with them and
hearing how things
are going. During
planting and harvest,
she noted, “they are
quick shoppers,” but
they always spare a little time to visit.
Her store has a variety of home décor,
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“The farmhouse home décor is popular.
It goes back to the roots of what
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84 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Linda Snyder is another
DeWitt business owner
who sees the impact
farmers have. She and
her husband, Art, own
The Crossroads Inspired
Living & Garden Café
at 602 10th St., a business
that offers specialty
books, décor, artisan
keepsakes for men and
women and more, as
well as a restaurant. She
gestures to the thriving
downtown outside her
store windows to show
how important agriculture
is to the area.
“It’s not only what
farmers do that’s important,
but they are a primary
driver of the economy,”
Snyder said. “We
very much appreciate
what they do. Farming is
our roots, and we all understand
that in our state,
this is a primary driver.”
One of the best parts of
working in a rural community
is building relationships,
said Jay Irwin,
sales manager at Kriegers
of DeWitt, 2113 11th St.
Whether they are coming
in to talk about buying a
bigger truck or needing
a repair done, farmers
interact with the staff on
a daily basis.
“We get to know them.
We talk about their
business. Farmers have
had their share of ups and
downs. Their job is seven
days a week. They are
great people. You can
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Employee Goldie Ellis and President Tim Clark of Zirckelbach in Clinton discuss maintenance on a washing
machine in the store. Clark said farmers have an eye for quality and practicality.
tell they work hard, and
they care about the
community,” he said.
“Farmers buy a lot of
trucks and that business
trickles down,” Irwin
said. “They are the base
for what the town of
DeWitt is.”
For many local businesses,
overall sales –
especially of new items
when it comes to machinery
or appliances or
vehicles – goes up when
commodity prices are
high. But goods and services
or repairs are still
needed in leaner times.
When it comes to
repairs: “Farmers have
real-time needs,” Irwin
said. “We work together
to get them back out
there and running.”
Having a farming
background helps with
understanding how the
agriculture business
cycle impacts the local
economy, said Tim Clark,
president at Zirkelbach
Home Appliance, 225
Fifth Ave. in Clinton
“Farming is a business,”
said Clark, who
grew up and worked on
the family farm outside
of DeWitt, paying for
books and clothes for
high school with money
from his own checking
account. “Farmers have
to look at the income
and decide if they can
buy new products or if
they need to get things
repaired. Over the years,
you see the shifts into the
different modes. It has
a retail impact, whether
it’s a repair or something
new, farmers are coming
in our door.”
They are busy people,
with a discerning eye for
quality and a bent toward
practicality.
“That farmer walking
through the door wants
to know if that washing
machine is going to clean
my coveralls when I
crawl out from under the
combine,” Clark said.
As he drives by the
local ADM plant most
days, Clark said he
can see how important
commodities are to the
economy.
“You just see the semi
trucks loaded with corn,”
he said. “It’s what we are
built on.”
Zirkelbach store
manager Paul Hardison
agreed. “If we didn’t
have the farmers,” Hardison
said, “I don’t know if
we’d be here.” n
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 85

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Gifts from the heart
Quietly philanthropic, farmers leave their legacy by providing
scholarships, sustaining charitable causes and supporting community
projects through gifts of grain, land and life insurance policies
Dan and Don
Burzlaff
Grand Mound
Don Burzlaff and his family
believe in giving back to the
community. The family has
a decades’ long history of
donating grain for charitable
causes. Don’s son, Dan,
raises hogs and runs the
farm operation. He often will
donate a hog for community
events, such as the Welton
Fire Department’s raffle.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
St. John’s Lutheran
Church is just a stone’s
throw from Don Burzlaff’s
family farm in
rural Grand Mound.
Last year, the tidy white-sided
church got a new roof, with some
help from Burzlaff, its neighbor
to the north and a congregation
member.
“I just like to help when I can,”
said Burzlaff, who recently retired
from farming. His son Dan now
runs the operation, growing corn
and soybeans and raising hogs.
Over the years, when Burzlaff
saw a need, he quietly addressed it
by loading his “little wagon” full
of grain, taking it to the elevator,
and requesting that the proceeds
go to a charitable cause.
That wagon, which can carry
250 bushels of corn or soybeans,
has made many trips to the elevator
to benefit the church, the
Central Community Historical Society,
and the DeWitt Community
Hospital Foundation, among other
organizations.
“I do it because I can,” Burzlaff
said, sitting at his kitchen table on
a recent rainy afternoon, humbly
hesitant to talk about his dona-
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 87

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Robin Krogman,
Director,
DeWitt Community
Hospital Foundation
tions but also happy to explain the
value farmers can bring to friends,
neighbors and organizations. “This
community was so good to us, and
we want to give back.”
He is one of dozens of farmers
in Eastern Iowa who fund scholarships,
educational opportunities,
charities, schools, medical outreach
and more through donating
grain, endowing land or gifting
life insurance policies through a
foundation.
The money received from the
sale of the grain makes a tangible
difference, said Robin Krogman,
director of the DeWitt Community
Hospital Foundation, which has
been the recipient of the Burzlaff
family’s generosity for years.
“Don Burzlaff and his family understand
what
it means to be
philanthropic
and to give
back to their
community.
Our foundation
has benefited
from their kindness
as we are
able to give out
scholarships
for our CNAs
(certified nursing
assistants) to have continuing
education,” Krogman said.
Westwing Place, which is a
long-term nursing care unit, and
Genesis Medical Center, DeWitt,
continually train their staff on
countless things to keep them on
the top tier of healthcare, such
as medication aide, rehabilitation
aide, wound care, and social
service assistance, Krogman said.
Gifts like Burzlaff’s make that
happen.
Rural communities have a deeply
rooted tradition of giving back
to their communities, said Paul
Erbes, vice president for development
at Wartburg Seminary in
Dubuque.
Burzlaff’s church in Grand
Mound is affiliated with the Wartburg
Seminary.
Erbes grew up on a farm in Minnesota
and later became a parish
pastor.
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western Kansas,” he said. “It was
late summer, and I remember
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
Paul Erbes
Vice President for Development,
Wartburg Seminary
getting a phone call from
the grain elevator telling
me I had 5,000 bushels
of wheat there for the
church.”
He said it made him
laugh.
“I didn’t realize growing
up on a farm was a
key part of my education
to be a pastor,” he said.
Today, Wartburg Seminary
receives donations
of grain from a core
group of farmers. That
money is used to support
the training of new pastors
and for other student
educational opportunities.
“That gift of grain has
a huge impact on future
pastors for the church,”
Erbes said.
“The neat part is the
Bible is filled with illustrations
of giving first
fruit,” he said. “There’s
this whole concept of if I
have a field, a garden, or
whatever in abundance,
I offer thanks to God by
sharing it with others.
The other piece is that
there’s a real beauty in
allowing the community
of congregation to participate
in the joy and the
risk of farming.” n
Farmers can share
gifts in many ways
The Community
Foundation of Greater
Dubuque, with affiliate
foundations in Jackson,
Jones and Clinton counties,
operates a Gift of
Grain program as an
option for donations. The
foundation started tracking
gifts of grain separately
in November 2013,
and since then it has
received 90 gifts totaling
$366,909, said Amy
Manternach, the foundation’s
vice president for
finance and philanthropy.
“Farmers have a
philanthropic spirit,” she
said. “And as awareness
of the program grows,
the number of gifts grow.
It’s one way they can
leave a legacy.”
Under the Community
Foundation of Greater
Dubuque’s program, after
contacting the foundation
about the gift, farmers
deliver their grain to the
elevator as a gift to the
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
foundation, and then the elevator
sends the foundation a notification
of receipt. The foundation makes
sure the donation is directed to
the organization of the farmer’s
choice, Manternach said.
While the donation is non-deductible
on the farmer’s taxes, the
farmer does not have to declare
the amount of grain as income to
the farming operation, Manternach
explained. Farmers can deduct
the cost of growing the crops,
which typically result in savings
on self-employment tax, federal
income tax and state income
tax. While the donations are not
considered charitable deductions,
they are eligible for Endow Iowa,
which is a 25 percent state tax
credit on the total value of the gift.
Amy Manternach
Vice President
for Finance and
Philanthropy,
Community Foundation
of Greater Dubuque
Pat Henricksen
and Roger
Hill are involved
with the
LincolnWay
Community
Foundation.
They note
many programs
made possible
by donations
from farmers.
“There are so
many examples of local students
who have benefited from scholarships
and other programs that
farmers and landowners support,”
Hill said.
DeWitt couple Charlie and Joann
Harrington last year gifted a life
insurance policy to the Lincoln-
Way Community Foundation. The
proceeds established three endowment
funds totaling $140,000 each
to annually support the DeWitt
Hospital Foundation, the DeWitt
United Methodist Church, and the
Central Education Foundation with
preference given to ag programs.
Growing up in DeWitt, Charlie
Harrington has spent his entire
life on the farm. Joanne shared his
love, and they raised their children
on their century farm.
“The Harringtons are a reminder
that our region is full of generous
people creating greater good,”
Henrickson said. “The Community
Foundation is proud to bring
people together to strengthen our
communities and inspire giving for
lasting change.” n
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
Farmers started St. Patrick’s
and keep it going today
A band of farmers driven
to new lands began the
church’s 178-year story
BY SARA MILLHOUSE
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
In 1840, a man on the path
to sainthood saw the need
for God in Makotiti, the
northwest region of Jackson
Country where Irish immigrants
were putting down roots.
They had been pushed from their
native Cork and Limerick by impoverishment
and persecution, and
they were pulled west by the cheap
price of land, $1.25 an acre. These
poor Irish farmers saw hope in the
Eastern Iowa soil.
The Rev. Samuel Mazzuchelli
directed the 42 men of the community
to prepare beams, 20- to
40-feet long, and bring them
together to erect the log church of
St. Patrick. It was the first rural
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
The tombstone for John Ferris (1772-1892)
states: “Came to Garryowen in 1839 with
a price on his head for his part in the Irish
Rebellion against England.” The cemetery is
located on the property at St. Patrick’s.
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
Catholic church in Iowa.
More than 175 years later, the
descendants of many of those
original farmers continue to till
the land nearby, or rent it to others,
raise cattle or work in tiny
Bernard, nearby. Many of these
descendants still climb the steps
to St. Patrick’s Church for Mass.
They open the same door, walk
on the same floor and sit in the
same pews as where their greatgreat-great
grandparents listened
intently, or swung their legs impatiently,
while the priest said Mass.
From “100 souls” in 1840, the
community grew to 600 in three
years and soon boasted a school.
By 1853, St. Patrick parishioners
were ready to build a stone church,
a permanent place to gather and
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
St. Patrick’s
Church
Garryowen
Mary English, Don Meloy, Alan Gravel,
Joyce Gibbs, Mike Burke and Sr. Marlene
McDonnell, SFCC, are some of the loyal
parishioners at St. Patrick’s, Garryowen.
Many parishioners can trace their family
trees back to the Irish immigrants who
founded the church with the Rev. Samuel
Mazzuchelli 180 years ago.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
practice their faith. Limestone
for the church was quarried three
miles south and hauled to the
construction site by oxen. The lime
was kilned in the area also. Parishioners
did the unskilled labor,
while expert stonemasons fitted
and finished the pieces.
The now-beautifully-repainted
statues in the church came
from further afield, perhaps Italy.
Stained glass came from Germany.
It was a tremendous investment
for people with few resources and
great risk, trying to eke out a new
life for themselves in America.
They ran out of money when
they reached the church’s eaves,
so prominent parishioners walked
to Dubuque to get a loan, putting
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WHY FARMERS MATTER
up their own hard-worked land as
collateral. A loan obtained for the
church, they returned to Garryowen
in a mood “of great merriment,”
as the story goes.
Over time, the farmers and their
families who built the church continued
to support it, and it continued
to support them through cycles
of marriages, deaths, celebrations
and crises. The town name
changed to Garryowen, in honor of
Limerick and under the influence
of Dennis Mahoney.
Across the Midwest, the pattern
repeated, as farmers plowed,
raised families and animals and
built churches.
About 40 rural churches operated
in Jackson County alone,
according to Jackson County
Donald Wentworth
Jackson County
Historian
historian Donald
Wentworth.
Religion and
culture divided
some farming
communities:
for example,
“old Springbrook”
was
about a mile
east of the
current town, until Catholics built
their church at the new location,
and the Protestant community
faded.
Though many rural churches
closed as roads improved and
centralized commerce, those that
remain have “deep roots,” Wentworth
said.
Garryowen served as the mother
church for other parishes, including
Cascade, Bellevue, South
Garryowen, Temple Hill, Bellevue,
Silvia Switch, Fillmore and
the first parish in Nebraska. Five
priests have been called from their
home Garryowen parish, as have
67 nuns.
Eventually, the town center
transferred to Bernard just up the
road. The general store and the
dance hall at Garryowen closed.
The parish school grew and expanded,
then was folded into
Aquin in Cascade. Agriculture
changed, too: mechanizing and
changing from diversified, smaller
acreages to row crops.
Many of the last names of early
settlers are still familiar in the
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The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing.
- Marcus Aurelius
parish today. The first
baptisms in the church
were for William Mc-
Dermott and William
Burke. Their decendents
still attend. Most
can explain, exactly or
approximately, when
their ancestors came to
Garryowen. Everyone
gives a hard time to Alan
Gravel, the sole German-American
among
them.
Surrounded by farmland,
everyone at the
church is tied to agriculture,
even those not
currently farming. The
stone church, on 60
acres and set amid high
summer corn, stands as a
monument to the sacrifices
pioneer families
made to build up their
faith and their livelihoods.
It serves its mission
well. Parishioners tell
of special celebrations,
former Christmases at
Garryowen with sleigh
rides and decorations,
proud moments when
sons of the parish chose
priesthood, and the
annual St. Patrick’s Day
breakfast and Mass, always
the Sunday before
St. Patrick’s Day.
In 2015, the church
opened its refurbished
doors to celebrate its
175th anniversary. About
130 families call St. Patrick
home, and that day,
the church was packed.
Gravel said that donations
for the restoration,
roof and steeple work
came from parishioners
and others who maintain
a connection to the
church. They are investing
in its next 175 years.
“People turn out, and
it’s very much about
volunteering,” said Sr.
Marlene McDonnell,
SFCC, who returned to
Garryowen upon retirement.
She could be
speaking about any time
in the church’s history.
“They help out and pitch
in.” n
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EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Eighty-mile-per-hour
wildfires swept across
southern Kansas, the
Oklahoma panhandle
and northern Texas
in March 2017. Seven people and
tens of thousands of cattle died.
Hundreds of thousands of acres—
maybe a million total—burned.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
Many eastern Iowans pitched in to help Kansas ranchers devastated by wildfires in 2017.
From left is a Kansas rancher who received their help and eastern Iowans Pat Schwartz,
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Homes, businesses, and all the
infrastructure of ranching, including
an estimated 100,000 miles of
fence, went up in smoke. After the
fire, the land looked like a moonscape.
Bryant farmer Pat Schwartz was
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100 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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WHY FARMERS MATTER
stuck in a snowstorm in
Milwaukee when he saw
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That evening, he posted
online that he wanted to
help.
The response was
overwhelming. People
offered hay, trucking and
fencing supplies to help
ranchers. Others offered
bottled water, lip balm
and envelopes of cash.
Soon, Schwartz and his
neighbors, Jason and Stacie
Farrell of Elvira, were
among the American
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / CONTRIBUTED
An oversize load of donated hay traveled down the road with a special
message to its recipients: “To: Kansas. Love: Iowa.”
cattlemen and farmers
en route to Ashland Feed
and Seed, the epicenter
of the wildfire.
Steeped in the tradition
of farmers helping farmers,
people like Schwartz
and the Farrells didn’t
think twice about stepping
in to help ranchers
who were watching their
animals suffer and their
livelihoods unravel.
“You just do it because
it’s the right thing to do,”
Jason said. “You just do
the right thing when you
have to.”
It’s about 900 miles
from Elvira, Iowa, to Ashland.
“To me, it was just
another day,” Jason said.
“I hauled a load of hay, I
just didn’t get paid for it.
But that’s what we do.”
People along the way
gave them thumbs up and
thankfulness.
“I had a pickup turn
around in the middle of
the road, he got out and
shook my hand and said,
‘Thanks for what you’re
doing.’” Jason said.
“That’s when you know
102 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
you’re doing something right.”
On their trips, they saw the fire’s
aftermath firsthand. “It wakes
you up pretty good when you get
within 15, 20 miles and all you see
is black,” Jason said.
The store sent them and their first
load of hay directly to a ranch at
the edge of the wildfire. The rancher’s
cattle had survived, but he had
lost most of his pasture ground.
“It’s humbling,” Schwartz said.
“This guy lost everything but
the clothes on his back, and he’s
standing and joking with you. It
makes your problems seem petty
when you see that.”
The community response in
Jackson and Clinton counties
expanded, with the counties’ Cattlemen
organizations and the Farm
Bureau fundraising. Theisen’s and
Gasser’s helped out.
Dan Bush of Thompson, Mark
and Doug Lane of Preston and
Dustin Johnson of Andover donated
full loads of hay. Dave Farrell
of Bryant joined in the haul, and
they made “life-long” friends with
Wisconsinite Joshua Arndt, who
joined their convoy. Mike Wenzel
of Goose Lake took a gooseneck
load of supplies, and Alyssa Rorah
of Delmar donated fencing supplies.
Wes Schwartz of Bryant
donated a half-load of hay. RVH
Trucking of Wheatland filled up
the local farmers’ trucks with fuel
when they returned. These are only
a few of the dozens of people locally
who contributed significantly.
Schwartz and the Farrells made
several trips to Kansas in spring of
2017.
All the donations—including
significant ones—are too numerous
and disparate to name.
“It really was a community effort,”
Schwartz said.
The local response was part of
an outpouring of support for the
devastated ranching communities,
especially from farmers elsewhere.
“It’s great to know that you have
neighbors, even if it’s states away,”
Stacie said. “It really, really helps
restore your faith in humanity.”
If disaster struck again, Jason
said he “wouldn’t bat an eye.
We’re super busy, and God forbid
it would ever happen, but it goes
both ways. Those people would be
here in a heartbeat.” n
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 103

WHY FARMERS MATTER
Caring
for the land
Conservation practices at abbey and elsewhere
preserve soil for generations to come
BY SARA MILLHOUSE
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Dave Ruden’s eyes
light up.
“I’m really, really
interested in
prairie strips,” he
said, pointing to a low grass strip
between the high cornrows just out
the truck window. “Imagine that in
prairie, permanently.”
Ruden’s life is caught up in the
intersection of agriculture and
conservation, from milking as a
teenager at his parents’ cattle, hog
and dairy farm near Bernard to
working with cropland renters and
monks as farm manager at New
Melleray Abbey south of Peosta.
When he finishes work at the abbey,
he might head to a Dubuque
Soil and Water Conservation board
meeting or a watershed management
authority meeting for Catfish
Creek or the Maquoketa River.
His actions, both on the abbey
grounds and as a commissioner,
trickle down to affect those
downstream, and those who will
come after him. Soil conservation
practices have taken root across
Eastern Iowa as farmers are implementing
a variety of techniques.
The abbey property is one such
example.
A little less than 10 years ago,
the monks made the difficult decision
to cease farming their land,
beyond a vegetable garden that
provides much of their food. The
monks were aging, and they sold
their equipment. Ruden fielded
104 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

WHY FARMERS MATTER
calls from around the
country from people
interested in getting a
chunk of that well-maintained
dirt.
For Ruden, the hard
part was giving up work
with the Abbey’s prize
black Angus herd.
“I really miss them,” he
said.
The monks started renting
their 2,000 acres of
cropland to two farmers,
Charles McCullough and
Kenny Hosch, on a cashrent
basis. In exchange
for use of that dirt, the
renters must also follow
Dave Ruden’s life work
combines agriculture
and conservation.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
strict covenants limiting
anhydrous, Roundup and
genetically-modified crop
use. Ruden explained that
he often serves as a liaison
between the monks
and the outside world, a
buffer of sorts.
Speaking of buffers,
conservation practices are
evident everywhere in the
farm — contours, riparian
buffers, grass strips,
prairie patches. There are
800 acres of cover crops
on the abbey grounds.
They’re experimenting
with pollinator plots.
Meanwhile, the
Dubuque County SWCD
is holding evening classes
on cover crops. Ruden
said there’s definitely a
learning curve to them.
Some farmers are working
with planting in the
middle of a rye cover
crop field. Others crimp
the rye down but let it lie
in the fields.
All this builds up organic
material and the capacity
to retain nitrogen
in the soil year-round.
“Most guys are treating
plants,” Ruden said. “If
you treat the soil like a
living thing, the plants’ll
take care of themselves.”
He acknowledges that
high machinery costs
can crimp cover crop
plantings but argues that
it’s worth it whenever
possible.
“The only resource
you can’t replace is your
soil,” he said.
Driving the abbey
property shows the scale
of the place. Besides the
cropland, there’s 1,400
acres in timber. Some
of that timber goes into
Trappist caskets, which
have brought the monks
a new income.
The monks started out
with just 500 acres, along
with a cow and a mule,
Ruden explains, but they
bought up surrounding
lands from fellow Irish
immigrants when many
left to serve in the Civil
War. The land is steeped
with stories and tradition:
on one country road
corner, a perfectly maintained
(and regularly used)
ball diamond takes up the
“richest land on the farm,”
Ruden joked. Two patches
of trees with mowed
benches like a park rise
from corn and bean fields.
That’s where the monks
used to stop to water their
mules, Ruden said.
“As long as I’m here,
they won’t be plowed,”
he said.
Catfish Creek starts on
the New Melleray property
and flows through
Swiss Valley Park, the
Mines of Spain, ag land
and urban development
before meeting the
Mississippi. As such, it
provided an opportunity
for the city of Dubuque,
Dubuque County and the
soil and water district
to work together. The
watershed has a generous
75 percent costshare on
conservation practices,
even when cash is not so
flush for conservation in
many areas. It is helping
new home builders aerate
their soil and rebuild it to
hold water.
They just agreed to
hire a specialist who will
work on ag practices, doing
door-to-door outreach
to farmers. Always energetic,
Ruden pauses for
a moment. “I just know
we’re missing people,”
he said. n
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 105

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FARMING
IN PRINT
A shelf of my favorite titles
on what it means to love
and live with the land
BY LOWELL CARLSON
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
The evolution of agriculture,
within my 74 years, is
nothing short of astounding.
World War II was a watershed
event that triggered
such innovations in farming as fresh
frozen vegetables, vast expansion of
irrigation and electrical service,
a farm tractor horsepower race,
explosion of hybrid seed and
yield improvement, fertilizer and
weed and insect chemicals.
The story of farming is one of
the great tales of human achievement,
and yet the general public
remains largely unaware of this
most basic human endeavor,
both fiction and non-fiction
subjects. As long as the dairy
case and produce section at
the supermarket is stocked
there is little need to understand
the human side of food
availability.
It takes a keen ear to write
non-fiction let alone fiction about farming.
One outstanding example of Midwest rural fiction is
Minnesota author Will Weaver.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
108 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

FARMING IN PRINT
His short story, “Gravestone Made
of Wheat,” is a poignant look at a
Scandinavian farm community’s shoddy
treatment of a young farmer’s new
immigrant bride during World War I’s
anti-German hysteria.
Explaining the changes in farming
and the history of how we have arrived
at this point calls for authors who are
comfortable with prose and with precision
of expression about an industry
that combines science, social history,
economics and just plain luck sometimes.
The history of science in agriculture,
the conquest of tick fever in the South,
development of polled cattle breeds, the
campaign to conserve topsoil and ongoing
struggle to control water pollution
in farming communities, these issues
are central to quality of life and subjects
of essential reading for the future.
Here are my suggestions for both farm
readers and the general public, a shelf of
books that tell of achievements, failures,
landmarks in service to mankind and
cautionary tales we ignore at our own
peril in feeding future generations.
Farming favorites
from my library
Franklin Russell’s (1961) “Watchers
at the Pond,” New York, Alfred Knopf,
more than any other book before or
since flung wide the window with a
view of nature for me. Iowa
DNR biologist Bob Sheets
suggested I read it, and it
changed forever how I ranked
and valued formerly invisible
but crucial creatures.
Russell’s year-long study
of life in a small pond near
Hamilton, Ontario, was poetic at
the same time it was analytical
and revealing. It proved that most
likely God didn’t despise the
same critters I did nor hate the
grass and broadleaf “weeds” I
swore eternal war on.
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 109

FARMING IN PRINT
Grant Gould (1988) wrote “The Honey
Bee,” New York, Scientific American
Library, to explain one of nature’s most
complex organisms and ended up with
a beautiful description of insect communication,
social order and even body
language when opportunity knocks. Clear,
precise writing can make science a wonderful
discovery for a person like me who
uses the word “approximately” to excess.
Nelson Klose (1950) “America’s Crop
Heritage,” Ames, Iowa State College
Press, is another of my favorites. It tells
the history of sometimes daring plant
explorers as they scoured remote corners
of the Old World for new crops, like sorghums
from Africa, soybeans from China,
potatoes from South America. I looked at
seeds from a whole new viewpoint, the
tenuous transfer of life and bulwark of our
very culture.
From tenuous crop introductions to
multi-billion-dollar industry, all from
sometimes smuggled handfuls of precious
seeds, Klose’s account of seed introductions
for a growing ag industry rings
authentic still today.
For example, German immigrant
Wendelin Grimm, in 1857, brought some
alfalfa seeds to Minnesota with him from
Baden, and the rest is forage history.
I fell in love with Betty Fussell’s (1992)
“The Story of Corn,” New York, North
Point Press, the minute I opened it. It was
during my “corn phase” of interest. There
is little, including the origin of Corn Nuts,
that isn’t covered in Fussell’s magnificent
book about the greatest gift of the Americas
to the world, besides the potato. Her
book was even winner of the Julia Child
cookbook award.
Cynthia Clampitt’s (2015) “Midwest
Maize: How Corn Shaped the U.S.
Heartland,” Urbana, University of Illinois
Press, is a very good history and reference
for Iowa’s most famous export. Field
corn’s influence on our culture is so pervasive
there isn’t time or space to delve into
how thoroughly we live and breathe this
crop regardless of how removed you are
from the farm.
Pat O’Rourke, Jackson County farmer/
supervisor, told me once there were just
three things introduced in farming after
World War II that would pay for themselves:
electric fences, pole buildings and
crop hybrids. The high price of modern
farm seeds reflects the vastly superior
qualities they possess over old open-pollinated
varieties.
If you ever spent any time in a haymow
as a youngster either throwing bales or
discovering a litter of new kittens hiding
in dark hay bale recesses, your heart will
ache with Steven R. Hoffbeck’s (2000)
“The Haymakers: A Chronicle of Five
Farm Families,” St. Paul, Minnesota
Historical Society.
For those of us lucky enough to sweat
through character-building haymaking
in Iowa, the description of haymaking is
much more than broad strokes. It speaks
of obligations and promises to family, to
livestock, to the land.
M.G. Kains, author of the 1935 best
seller “Five Acres and Independence,”
New York, Dover Publications, Inc., was
the Pied Piper of packing up the family
and moving to the country during a very
chaotic, stressful decade here in America,
the Great Depression.
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110 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

The idea of self-sufficiency
and self-reliance on land you
could farm with a Farmall
Cub or Ford-Ferguson or even
a plow horse was appealing.
When the back-to-the-land
movement resurfaced in the
1980s Kain’s book was revived
along with publications
like Mother Earth News here
in the United States and Harrowsmith,
the classy, glossy
alternative lifestyle magazine
Canada adored until most of
the enthusiasts found smallscale
farming so bone-crushing
hard they went back to their
flats or settled in the suburbs
and now follow their grandchildren’s
activities.
The fact a major portion of
the wealth generated in Iowa’s
rural communities has everything
to do with the capricious
nature of weather during the
growing season is bound to
have an effect on the people
who live here in Iowa.
Douglas Bauer’s (1979)
modern classic “Prairie
City, Iowa: Three Seasons
at Home,” Ames, Iowa State
University Press, is like a key
to the front door of life in rural
Iowa. The affection and familiarity
Bauer writes with soon
makes you visualize the cracks
in the sidewalk, the flaws and
the beauty of these farm and
small town characters.
Aldo Leopold, an Iowa-born
founding father of conservation
thinking, found a universe
of living interdependence on a
small, worn-out farm in central
Wisconsin. There he retreated
from professional and academic
duties at the University
of Wisconsin, Madison. His
(1949) collection, “A Sand
County Almanac and Sketches
Here and There,” New
York, Oxford University Press,
was virtually in everyone’s
book bag at one time.
The same for the great Wendell
Berry and his influential
1977 slim book “The Unsettling
of America: Culture &
Agriculture,” San Francisco,
Sierra Club Books. It did not
FARMING IN PRINT
impede consolidation of assets
(land, wealth) in farming
communities, but at least we
were warned when the decay
of main streets and industrial
farming became the norm.
Wendell Berry has kept the
issue of concentration of land
ownership on the table through
eloquent prose almost single
handedly.
Farmers linger in the past at
their own peril, but knowing
the past allows you to make
new mistakes and not merely
repeat previous mistakes.
Some books on agriculture
are just a pleasure to read.
Here are a handful of titles that
illuminate and illustrate key
moments in agriculture.
Henry D and Frances T. Mc-
Callum (1965) “The Wire that
Fenced the West,” Norman,
University of Oklahoma Press.
Joseph Glidden’s invention
in turn prompted the familiar
saying: “good fences make
good neighbors.”
Barbed wire was a blessing;
it was also a curse. It changed
the very foundation of modern
crop and livestock. It triggered
armed retaliation when used
to fence off water and prime
grazing on public land in
Wyoming.
It went into battle during
World War I. Barbed wire
helped improve forage production
and selective breeding of
superior cattle.
Of all publishers, National
Geographic’s Bill Law’s
(2010) strangely interesting
“The Field Guide to Fields,”
Washington, National Geographic
Society, is a great little
— almost handbook size — introduction
to farming’s focus,
fields and the crops we grow
around the world. If I were
first learning about agriculture
this would be a good start.
Fields, meadows and prairies
are universal, no matter
if in Mongolia or Montana.
They’re the medium for this
great pillar of all civilization,
production of human food or
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 111

The Eastern Iowa
Farmer
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A Midwest home for a glob
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
Steven Franks, Tammy Brown, Luke McGuire, Elia Gnesutta, Flippo Lavelli, Nate Wolf, Justin Jones, Barbara Carpenter and Sarah Thuenen are
the team at Maschio Gaspardo’s North American headquarters located in DeWitt.
Italian ag machinery maker with facilities worldwide
plants its North American roots firmly in DeWitt
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Visitors who walk into the lobby
at Maschio Gaspardo in De-
Witt are greeted by a sign that
bids them “Benvenuti.”
That’s Italian for “welcome.”
Pictures hanging on the walls throughout
the front office show the company’s
signature red agricultural equipment,
along with slogans that appear in Italian,
German, Spanish, English, and other
languages.
“Es wird zeit, auch in den boden zu investiern,”
or “Long lasting performance,
maintenance free,” reads a display with
photographs of a Maschio tiller at work.
In Italian: “Riduce i passaggi, ottimizza
la rese.”
The nondescript office/warehouse
building tucked away in the southeast
corner of DeWitt is the North American
headquarters of Maschio Gaspardo, a firm
114 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

al operation
GIFTS OF GRAIN
SUPPORT THE
LIBRARY EXPANSION
A generous contribution of grain
will support:
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• Teen Technology Zone
• Flexible Meeting Spaces
• Access to Technology
• More Computers
• More Independent Study Spaces
IMAGINE THE POSSIBILITIES...
based in Italy with operations
all over the world.
“Great things are happening
there,” said Angela Rheingans,
executive director for the De-
Witt Chamber & Development
Co. “They get great support
from their corporate office,
and the business is incredibly
well-managed and run. They
are a wonderful company to
have in DeWitt. All the diversity
of our businesses adds
to the overall economy and
flavor of our community.”
The proximity to John
Deere and its global business
made DeWitt an attractive
location for the company
that produces equipment for
tillage, seeding/planting, crop
protection, landscaping and
hay making.
“The Midwest is one of the
big markets for the agriculture
business,” said Filippo
Lavelli, the general manager
of Maschio Gaspardo North
America Inc. “It makes sense
for us to be here.”
A specialized product
Among its machines,
Maschio Gaspardo produces
DONATE NOW!
Jillian Aschliman, Library Director
(563) 659-5523 | jillianaschliman@dewitt.lib.ia.us
Library hours: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday: 10am-8pm
Wednesday & Friday: 10am-5pm
Saturday: 10am-4pm; Sunday: Closed
https://dewitt.lib.ia.us/
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 115

MASCHIO GASPARDO
EXPERIENCE
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European-style machinery of
the size and type that is used
on the east and west coasts of
the United States in such specialized
markets as vineyards
and orchards. Vegetable growers
with a grocery network, for
example, or farmers producing
such crops as carrots, onions
and spinach also use Maschio
Gaspardo-made tillers.
Opportunities for growth in
the Midwest market, as well
as proximity to many transportation
modes, made Iowa a
prime spot for its presence on
this continent.
“We are increasing overall
in North America. We are
building up a dealer network
to be more present in the
market,” said Lavelli, adding
that the company currently
has about 100 North American
dealers.
“We like it here.
DeWitt is a good
place to do
business.”
— FILIPPO LAVELLI
Maschio Gaspardo initially
set up shop in a small building
in Eldridge to support its business
supplying John Deere in
Davenport with rotary tillers
sold under the Frontier brand
name.
“We supply John Deere with
after-sales service and spare
parts,” Lavelli said, adding
that by 2015 the company
needed a bigger building.
“We were growing pretty
fast,” he said, selling more
products from Italy and manufacturing
plants worldwide.
The DeWitt location was a
perfect fit, and it offers room
to grow. The North American
headquarters currently
employs 10 people, with an
additional six sales people on
the road.
“Our main goal here is to
develop our business with
John Deere, sell our products
to the local community and
develop a sales network,”
Lavelli said.
On a recent day in June, the
122,350-square-foot building
was full with equipment
that had arrived via container
ships the month before. An
overhead crane was moving
equipment for shipping, and a
semi-truck was being loaded
up to haul product away.
Many of the products that
arrive in DeWitt come in by
way of ports in New York,
Norfolk and Savannah. They
make their way to Chicago by
rail and then to Iowa by truck.
The building leaves room
for future growth or a possible
assembly line, although
there are no firm plans at the
moment, Lavelli said. The uncertainty
of what will happen
with global trade impacts all
businesses. However, because
Maschio Gaspardo is in a
variety of locations on three
continents, it is in a unique
position.
“If you have a crisis in one
place, the upside will come
later,” Lavelli said.
116 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

MASCHIO GASPARDO
good state
Steven Franks prepares a shipment in
the warehouse of Maschio Gaspardo.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
Humble beginnings
“If you work the land, it
will pay you back.”
That is the philosophy behind
Maschio Gaspardo.
Its global network of
production plants and some
2,200 employees is a long
way from its humble beginnings
in 1964 when brothers
Egidio and Giorgio Maschio
started producing rotary
tillers in the barn of their
house. That barn, used as
a mechanical workshop, is
known as the “casetta delle
frese,” or the small house of
tillers. Today the company
is a major industrial group
with operations in Romania,
China, India, France, Germany,
Spain, Russia, Ukraine,
Poland, Turkey and South
Africa.
In 1994 the company
acquired Gaspardo Seminatrici,
a company that began
producing seed drills in 1834.
Lavelli, who grew up near
Venice, started with the company
working in sales and
marketing in 2009, overseeing
efforts in southern Europe
and the Middle East markets.
In 2011, the president of
the company asked if he was
interested in moving to North
America.
He now oversees all operations
in the United States
and Canada, traveling back to
COMPANY:
Maschio Gaspardo North America Inc.
LOCATION:
112 3rd Avenue East, DeWitt, IA
FOUNDED: 1964 in Italy
WEBSITE: maschio.com
Italy about once a quarter to
report on any activities, goals
and strategies related to those
markets. He and Silvia, his
wife, live in Bettendorf with
their four daughters, Letizia,
Livia, Lorenza and Lucia.
“We like it here,” he said
of his family’s planting roots
in eastern Iowa. “DeWitt is a
good place to do business.”
And the operation has been
a good neighbor, Rheingans
said.
She recalled how Maschio
helped out Guardian Industries
when it was going
through a furnace rebuild
and needed extra storage for
products and materials for the
project, Rheingans said.
“They stepped up and said,
‘We have space, and we’re
conveniently located.’ That
was very neighborly and a
very DeWitt thing to do.” n
better state
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Contact an agent and let your opportunities overflow.
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Ron Neblung, Agent
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Bus: 563-242-3400
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Bus: 563-243-1060
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 117

Sharing and caring: Farmers ma
The Harringtons
The Deutmeyers
Contribution:
Life insurance Policy
After many successful years farming, DeWitt
couple Charlie and Joann Harrington decided they
wanted to pay it forward and help strengthen their
community. they gifted a life insurance policy to
the LincolnWay Community Foundation, which
established three endowment funds totaling $140,000 each to
annually support the DeWitt Hospital Foundation, the DeWitt
united Methodist Church, and the Central Education Foundation
with preference given to agricultural programs.
Life insurance is a simple way for people to give a significant
gift to charity, with tax benefits during their lifetime
Donors who receive taxable income from life insurance policies
can take advantage of several tax-advantaged ways to make those
assets work for them and the causes they support. For example,
donors who give to endowments through the Community
Foundation benefit from the Endow Iowa 25 percent State Tax
Credit in addition to federal charitable income tax deductions.
Contribution:
Gift of Grain
Since troy and Shelly Deutmeyer began farming 11
years ago, they’ve been fortunate to have had good
harvests. When they had the opportunity to contribute
to the beckman Catholic Schools blazing Forward
Endow iowa Fund, they chose to do so with a gift
of grain.
“if everyone does a little bit, it adds up,” troy said of their
decision. He and Shelly said that rather than sitting down
and writing a check, donating about two bushels per acre of
their farm average is an easy way to support education. their
son, Shawn, is a senior at beckman Catholic High School,
so they’ve seen firsthand the value of the schools and were
eager to support the campaign through the Dyersville Area
Community Foundation.
Gifts of Grain help donors save on taxes as they deduct the
cost of growing the crops. the gifts are excluded from income
and are eligible for state tax credit.
An Affiliate of the
Community Foundation of Greater Dubuque
The Community Foundation of Greater
and inspires giving along with affiliate

ke a difference in so many ways
Don Hughes
Pauline Antons
Contribution:
Gift of Land
Don Hughes spent a lifetime working on the farm,
first his father’s and then his own operation
near Goose Lake. He and his wife Linda, both
deceased, opted to gift their portion of a family
farm inheritance to provide for their church,
the Salvation Army, and Maquoketa and northeast schools
through a gift of land.
the foundation’s Your Land/Your Legacy program allows
landowners to create a charitable legacy to benefit the causes
they love most in the community while retaining income from
the land.
Landowners retain control over the land knowing it will
support their favorite causes forever. the landowner’s tenant
farmer of choice keeps the land in production. in addition
to landowners receiving a tax deduction for the charitable
portion of the gift, capital gains taxes can be avoided
or reduced. the asset of farmland is removed from the
possibility of estate taxes.
Community Foundation of
Jackson County
An Affiliate of the
Community Foundation of Greater Dubuque
Contribution:
irA rollover
Pauline Antons’ love for the land runs deep, as does
her desire to preserve it for the next generation.
Having served on the Jones Soil and Water
Conservation District (SWCD) board of
Commissioners since 1990, Antons has worked to
help landowners implement conservation practices.
She decided to make a generous donation with an
individual retirement account (irA) rollover to help establish
the SWCD endowment, which is invested and will grow over
time. it provides an annual payout so that SWCD can provide
scholarships to promote conservation for the next generation,
ensuring the preservation of the land Antons holds so dear.
People age 70½ and older can transfer up to $100,000 per
year from individual retirement accounts (irAs) to charity
— without incurring federal income taxes today or estate and
income taxes in the future. Gifts to endowments may also be
eligible for the Endow iowa 25 percent State tax Credit.
Jones County
Community Foundation
An Affiliate of the
Community Foundation of Greater Dubuque
Dubuque strengthens communities
partners in surrounding counties.
dbqfoundation.org

WHAT
EASTERN IOWA FARMER GRAPHIC /
BROOKE TAYLOR
120 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

‘You are the most valuable
thing on that farm’
Beyond taking care of business, farmers need
to take care of their mental health
BY SARA MILLHOUSE
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
There’s a reason
farmers need to
take care of stress,
sadness and general
mental health.
It’s the same reason farmers
need to take care of their physical
health: the farm depends
on it.
And if you’re not actively
farming, remember that your
family, your community and
your land still depend on you.
“We see it in our ag folks,
that every day they have so
many jobs to take care of,
they don’t have enough time
to think about themselves,”
said Charlotte Halverson, a
Dubuque County native and
resident who works as clinical
director of the AgriSafe
Network. “You are the most
valuable thing on that farm.
Yes, you’re the most important
thing on that operation.”
With low prices in crop and
livestock markets, stressful
tariff talks and newsstand
accounts of sky-high farmer
suicide rates, this seems to
be the year to talk about the
mental health of farmers, farm
workers and others in ag. The
news might not be quite as
dire as it sounds, though. The
Centers for Disease Control
this summer admitted making
a mistake in data classification
that inflated statistics regarding
farmer suicides.
Still, rural suicide rates have
been higher than urban suicide
rates for decades, and suicide
rates among employees of
farms is quite high, according
to CDC revised data.
The buzz on the topic has
brought the issue into public
discussion more than it’s been
since the farm crisis of the
1980s, when the threat of losing
livelihoods weighed heavily
on many farmers. Farm bill
proposals include funding for
ag mental health resources,
though those negotiations are
admittedly far from over.
Mike Rosmann is a Harlan,
Iowa, farmer who has also
worked as a clinical psychologist
for most of his life. He
SIMPLE LIFE?
eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 121

MENTAL HEALTH
talks about the “agrarian imperative,”
the drive to procure and
provide food, shelter and other
necessities. It’s
particularly
strong in farmers
and can
make it harder
to discover
alternative
fulfillment for
those not or no
longer farming.
Charlotte Halverson
Clinical Director,
AgriSafe Network
For farmers,
managing “ag
behavioral
health” starts
with basic self-care: eat well, get
enough sleep (which can be a challenge
even during the off-season)
and “making sure you get enough
“I would just encourage
people to openly think
about behavioral health as
something they need to
optimize in order to farm
successfully...”
— MIKE ROSMANN
exercise,” Halverson said. “We all
think that we get enough exercise
farming, but sometimes we need
something other than what the
farm life entails.”
Another issue for farm families,
and others in rural areas, is the
sheer lack of mental health providers.
The Substance Abuse and
Mental Health Services Administration
reports that more than half
the counties in the United States
don’t have a single practicing
psychiatrist, psychologist or social
worker. All are rural.
Halverson explained some of the
symptoms that could indicate that
someone’s not managing stress
well and could be slipping into
anxiety or depression. Symptoms
of anxiety that could benefit from
medical care may include anxiety
that lasts a couple weeks or more,
sleep interferences, shortness of
breath, tightness in the chest, a
rapid pulse, unexplained joint or
back pain, headaches or unusual
restlessness.
FARMING IS A BIG INVESTMENT.
LET US HELP YOU PROTECT IT.
Kerry W
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For all your home
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needs, contact:
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902 S Main #12, Maquoketa IA 52060 • Phone: (563)652-4485 • kerrywscott@hotmail.com
122 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

MENTAL HEALTH
Symptoms of depression
can include sleeping or eating
too much or too little and
unexpected substance abuse.
“Maybe you’re starting to
feel your judgment is not just
right, there’s a cloud over my
head all the time,” Halverson
said. “These are things that,
if you’re willing to tell your
health care provider, sometimes
it’s minimal, it’s not
always really drastic, but if
you notice it… it’s worth your
while.”
If you’re hesitating to ask
for help, or if you’re wondering
how to reach out to an independent-minded
loved one,
Rosmann offered advice.
“I would just encourage
Mike Rosmann
Clinical Psychologist
people
to openly
think
about
behavioral
health as
something
they need
to optimize
in
order to
farm successfully,
just as you deal with
diabetes and heart disease.
If you don’t, they could take
their toll on your capacity to
farm,” he said. “The more
that people see that, ‘I need to
invest in taking care of myself,’…
the more likely I am
to be able to farm well.” n
Iowa
Concern
Iowa Concern Hotline:
confidential assistance and
referral for stress, legal questions
and financial concerns.
(800) 447-1985
extension.iastate.edu/iowaconcern
Like you, we’re invested in seeing
our rural communities prosper.
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 123

MENTAL HEALTH
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Contact LG Seeds for more information:
Travis Stelken
District Sales Manager
(563) 451-7760
Randy Duegeon
Walcott, IA
(563) 271-5190
Randy Toenjes
Monticell, IA
(319) 213-4020
James Holtz
Lost Nation, IA
(563) 593-1150
Lahey Farms
Farley, IA
(563) 580-4753
Crop Production Services
(563) 689-5482 - Preston
(563) 488-2215 - Wyoming
(563) 875-2711 - Dyersville
Gene Banowetz
Welton, IA
(563) 659-5490
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Cascade, IA
(563) 543-3263
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Onslow, IA
(563) 299-0114
LG and design are registered trademarks of AgReliant Genetics, LLC. ©2017 AgReliant Genetics.
Four A’s
of
Stress Relief
AVOID:
• Take control of your surroundings
• Avoid people who bother you
• Learn to say no
• Ditch part of your list
ALTER:
• Respectfully ask others to change
their behavior
• Communicate your feelings openly
• Manage your time better
• State limits in advance
ACCEPT:
• Talk with someone
• Forgive
• Practice positive self-talk
• Learn from your mistakes
ADAPT:
• Adjust your standards
• Practice thought-stopping
• Reframe the issue
• Adopt a mantra
• Look at the big picture
Change in routines. The farmer
or family no longer participates in
activities they once enjoyed such as
church, 4-H or visiting at the local
diner.
Increase in illness. Stress puts
people at higher risk for upper
respiratory illnesses (colds, flu)
or other chronic conditions (aches,
pains, persistent cough).
Increase in farm accidents. Fatigue
and the inability to concentrate can
lead to greater risk of accidents.
Source:
Iowa State Extension
Signs of chronic, prolonged
stress in farm families:
Care of livestock declines. Animals
might show signs of neglect or abuse.
Decline in farmstead appearance.
The farm family no longer may take
pride in the way farm buildings and
grounds appear, or no longer have
time to do the maintenance work.
Children show signs of stress.
Children from families under stress
may act out, show a decline in
academic performance or be
increasingly absent from school.
They also may show signs of physical
abuse or neglect.
Source: Suzanne Pish, a social-emotional health extension educator with Michigan State
University Extension
124 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

irish Meadows
Yarn Barn & Boutique
Visit our store in a 3-story converted granary.
Located at the picturesque Irish Meadows Alpaca Farm in eastern Iowa’s Jackson County.
• Alpaca Yarn
• Alpaca Socks
• Alpaca Teddy
Bears, Horses,
Elephants & Lions
• Alpaca Accessories
• Mittens
• Home Decor
• Alpaca Blankets
• Rugs • Scarves
• Hats • Gloves
• Fingerless Gloves
• Sweaters & Jackets
• Dryer Balls
• Comforters & Pillows
45 min. north of Quad Cities,
20 min. south of Dubuque and
60 min. northeast of Cedar Rapids.
— From Farm to Fashion —
“Beautiful farm, yarn and gifts. Really enjoyed getting to see the
adorable alpacas. And I love my new cozy alpaca sweater!”
— a happy customer
Open: September-March Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays 10-5. Sundays in December 11-5.
April-August by appointment only. Call to schedule.
Full-service alpaca farm. Show-quality alpacas for sale.
23477 Bellevue Cascade Road (D-61),
La Motte, Iowa
563-543-1375
Mike & Julie Delaney,
Owners
Facebook.com/irishmeadowsyarnbarnandboutique
IrishMeadowsAlpacaFarm.com

How to stay
connected
with the FSA
If you have
any questions,
please contact
your local
FSA Office.
Cedar County
205 W. South St.,
Ste 3, Tipton, IA
52772
(563) 886-6061
Clinton County
1212 17th Ave.,
DeWitt, IA 52742.
(563) 659-3456
By ADRIENNA OLSON
Farm Service Agency
Jackson County Executive Director
adrienna.olson@ia.usda.gov
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Due to budget cuts throughout the years,
the county field offices have not been
able to consistently send out county
newsletters like in the past. County
producers were used to receiving a quarterly
newsletter with program updates. Today, county
offices are lucky to be able to send out two newsletters
a year. However, there are different tools
availabe to the county offices to deliver program
updates each month. Also, there are ways the
producers can stay connected right at home, with
the U.S. Department of Agrculture and the Farm
Service Agency.
Subscribe to GovDelivery emails
and text message notifications
Each month the FSA county offices are to send
an electronic newsletter through GovDelivery.
Relevant program information is delivered to
keep county producers informed on any changes
to programs or a reminder of program deadlines.
Don’t worry, your email inbox will not be flooded
with emails, as county offices are only allowed
to send a maximum of two emails a month. To
subscribe to GovDelivery emails, visit www.fsa.
usda.gov/subscribe or your local county office.
A person can choose to receive information by
topic, state, and/or county and can unsubscribe at
any time.
Also, through GovDelivery the county office
can send text messages to county subscribers.
Text message alerts are great to send program reminders,
specifically program deadlines to avoid
a potential late file fee. Subscribing is simple.
For Jackson County updates, text IAJackson to
FSANOW (372-669). Visit your local county office
for assistance or for county text information.
Standard text messaging rates apply. Contact your
wireless provider for details. Participants can
unsubscribe at any time.
Enroll into FSAfarm+
The FSA has a customer self-service website
known as FSAfarm+, which is a fast and easy
way to access your FSA farm information. Any
individual FSA program participant listed as
an operator or owner in FSA farm records, are
eligible to access FSAfarm+. Once registered for
FSAfarm+, participants can access their customer
profile, farm records information, and view and
print farm maps.
To access FSAfarm+, the participant must
receive a Level 2 eAuthentication from USDA via
www.eauth.usda.gov. Please visit your local FSA
county office for more information or visit www.
fsa.usda.gov/Farmplus.
Visit Farmers.gov
The USDA created farmers.gov as a comprehensive
website for farmers that is user friendly to
navigate. The vision for farmers.gov is to provide
“farmers, ranchers, private foresters, and agricultural
producers with online self-service applications,
educational materials, engagement opportunities,
and business tools to increase efficiency
and productivity while preserving and fostering
long-held traditional relationships between local
USDA offices and producers.” The farmers.
gov website is a helpful tool for beginning and
experienced farmers with more exciting features
to come. Check out farmers.gov today. n
Dubuque County
210 Bierman Road,
Epworth, IA 52045.
(563) 876-3328
Jackson County
601 E Platt St.,
Maquoketa, IA
52060.
(563) 652-3237
Jones County
300 Chamber Dr.,
Anamosa, IA
52205.
(563) 462-3517
126 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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Political issues
impact agriculture
Trade negotiations,
weather, farm bill results
weigh on farmers’ minds
and their bottom line
BY LARRY LOUGH
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
Just when government policies
were replacing weather and corn
prices as local farmers’ favorite
topics over a cup of coffee, a
prolonged dry spell hit southeast
Iowa.
Curt Allen, who farms corn and
soybeans east of DeWitt, said he saw a
similarity in both subject areas.
“Either one we don’t have much control
over, it seems like,” said Allen, 53.
The U.S. Drought Monitor in early
August labeled Clinton County as abnormally
dry and on the verge of moderate
drought. Some areas of far southern Iowa
were seeing severe drought.
All of which looked to “calories and
protein” farmer Dennis Campbell of
Grand Mound as a hit to corn yields at a
time when prices around $3.60 a bushel
were already failing to cover farmers’
expenses.
“Crops are not going to pay the bills,”
said Campbell, 50, which is a constant
risk that belies any romantic notions
about farm life. Debt-dependent farmers
have seen interest rates rising lately and a
five-year slide in net farm income, cutting
it by half.
Grand Mound farmer
Dennis Campbell said
crop prices aren’t covering
farmers’ expenses this season.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
TREVIS MAYFIELD
“It’s a bad evolution of an old Norman
Rockwell painting,” Campbell said.
But political issues were not being left
out of shop talk among producers.
ONE CENTURY STRONG
Since our start in 1918, the Jackson County Farm Bureau
has worked to support farmers, families, education and
economic development in our communities. Together,
we plant the seeds of success that bring a better quality
of life for all Iowans.
The Jackson County Farm Bureau salutes you, the proud
families who’ve held the plow steady for 100 years.
Together we embrace the strength and future
opportunities that will grow from being One Century Strong!
jackson.county@ifbf.org
563-652-2456
128 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

POLITICS
A 2018 farm bill was headed
to a congressional conference
committee to iron out
differences between the Senate
version and a more austere
House-passed bill. U.S. Sen.
Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, was
among the conferees charged
with finding a compromise
before the current farm bill
expired Sept. 30.
Renegotiating an “updated”
North American Free Trade
Alliance was also on the
agenda of the Trump Administration,
although talks with
both Canada and Mexico were
ongoing at press time.
And everyone has an opinion
about the ongoing trade
war between the U.S. and its
trading partners around the
world, which has been fought
with a series of tariffs and
retaliatory duties on many
American products, including
agricultural goods that were a
$20 billion business for Iowa
farmers with China alone in
2017.
With all of those issues
affecting the state’s agribusiness,
what has been the mood
of local farmers?
“The big thing is uncertainty
now,” said Skott Gent, 50,
who farms in eastern Jones
County. “Nervousness and
uncertainty.”
A long-term outlook
While the farm bill will
be resolved within a month,
and NAFTA has been more
political talk than real negotiations,
the developing trade
war is likely to be with us for
a while, according to Dermot
Hayes, a professor of economics
in the College of Agriculture
and Life Sciences at Iowa
State University.
Hayes, who studies U.S.
farm policy and international
agriculture trade, said the
tariff trade-off was responsible
for the “collapse” in June
of farm prices vital to Iowa’s
economy.
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 129

POLITICS
He figured the trade war
was responsible for soybean
prices being $1.75 a bushel
“lower than they should be,”
with corn 50 cents lower
and hogs down about $20 an
animal.
“We sell 46 million hogs a
year,” Hayes said of state pork
production. “Do the math.”
Considering Iowa exported
about $1.1 billion in pork last
year – more than a quarter of
the state’s production – hog
farmers will suffer, Hayes
said, and he saw no quick
resolution.
“The trade war is not
going to end soon,” he said.
“[Trump] ratcheted it up with
China, and they’re pretty
skilled negotiators. … I see no
near-term solution.”
Gent farms 400 acres with
his son and father: corn,
soybeans, hay, beef cows, and
some Berkshire sows.
“They need to stabilize the
market by getting trade figured
out,” he said, saying farmers
wanted fairness and stability.
“It’ll all work out at the end.
But the interim is kind of hard.
… Income dropped a whole
lot faster than expenses for
us.”
Allen had a more definite
timetable.
“I’d definitely like to get
overseas trade back,” he said.
“By spring, we need to see
some of these trade deals
worked out, or we’re going to
be hurting pretty good.”
Despite the current pain
they’re feeling, farmers are
not opposed to the president’s
strategy of attacking unfair
trade practices of some nations,
especially China.
“Do you like it? No,”
Campbell said of the trade
war. “But at some point, you
gotta hit back. … I think most
farmers support a wake-up
shot across the bow.”
Gent agreed, but suggested
the tough talk between nations
needed to give way to more
diplomacy.
“No question, things needed
Dermot Hayes
Professor of Economics,
Iowa State University
College of Agriculture and Life Sciences
to change,” he said of trading
practices. “But the president
is pretty abrupt about making
changes.”
Farm Bill may
reduce funding
for ag programs
Equally difficult might
be negotiations between the
House and Senate on a new
farm bill.
Funding for agriculture
programs is expected to be
lower than in the four-year
act that is expiring – as it was
in both the recent House- and
Senate-passed bills.
Farmers are likely to see
hits in conservation programs
and aid to young farmers to
get them started and keep
them afloat.
But the large majority of
money – 85 percent – in the
bill goes to food assistance
programs, especially the Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance
Program, more popularly
known as food stamps, which
is 70 percent of the spending.
Craig Gundersen, a professor
of agriculture strategy in
the College of Agricultural,
Consumer and Environmental
Services at the University of
Illinois, fears the effect of
drastic cuts to programs that
help low-income people. He
studies food insecurity and
food assistance programs, and
he said politics had traditionally
not entered the congressional
debate on anti-hunger
130 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

POLITICS
issues.
“Generally it’s a bipartisan
[position that] ending hunger
in the country is an important
thing,” he said. “Historically, at
least.”
Gundersen said he hoped the
committee would adopt something
close to the less austere
Senate version of the bill. In
addition to reducing funding,
the House-approved legislation
would stiffen work requirements
and allow states to set their own
gross income limits for people
to qualify for assistance.
“That would do damage to
SNAP and to lower-income
households,” Gundersen argued.
“The most efficient way to cut
expenses of SNAP is to have a
strong economy.”
He likened the challenges that
face farmers to those of low-income
Americans, as tariffs limit
markets for agricultural goods
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / L. BRIAN STAUFFER
Craig Gundersen
Professor of Agriculture Strategy,
University of Illinois
College of Agricultural, Consumer
and Environmental Services
and raise domestic prices for all
consumers, hitting hardest those
people who can least afford to
pay.
Both also are hurt by regulations:
farmers in added expenses
of compliance, and poor people
who see the job market tighten
and prices rise.
“The anti-hunger community
and farmers have a lot in common,”
Gundersen said. “These
groups might not seem to have
similar goals, but more often
than not you tend to see it.”
While the farm bill that
emerges from the Republican
Congress is not likely to provide
relief for low-income people,
the government has a $12 billion
plan to help farmers survive
the effects of the trade war.
Part of the plan involves
direct payments to farmers of
some crops, including Iowa
staples of corn, soybeans and
hogs. Sign-up was expected to
start around Labor Day.
Gent said he would consider
applying for the program.
“At this point, I’m going
to look at it,” he said in early
August, “whatever is available
to get us through this.” n
“The
anti-hunger
community and
farmers have a
lot in common.
These groups
might not seem
to have similar
goals, but more
often than
not you tend
to see it.”
— CRAIG GUNDERSEN
Prepare now
for unwanted
visitors.
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 131

Ag Bytes
Watershed and flood
resiliency focus of Upper
Mississippi River Conference
More than 200 stakeholders who represent
interests that range from agriculture,
manufacturing, energy and navigation to
tourism, the environment and flood control
will convene in the Quad Cities Oct. 24-25
at Stoney Creek Hotel & Conference Center
in Moline. They will discuss improving
flood resiliency in the Upper Mississippi
River region.
The 11th annual Upper Mississippi
River Conference — Our Watershed:
Working Together for Healthy Waters and
Flood-Resilient Communities — will focus
on floodplain issues facing the Mississippi
River watershed, which covers all or part
of 31 states in the nation. Presentations
will follow two tracks, floodplain/flood risk
management and water quality/biodiversity.
Speakers include Dr. Gerald Galloway,
University of Maryland; Chad Berginnis,
Association of State Flood Plain Managers;
Michael Sutfin, building and zoning
official in Ottawa, Illinois; Col. Bryan
Sizemore, St. Louis District Commander,
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; and Mary
Miss, artist and founder, City as Living
Laboratory.
The conference is hosted by River
Action, a non-profit organization that
works to protect and restore the upper
Mississippi River in the Quad City area,
foster cultural and economic river-related
activities and raise awareness of sustainable
practices that enhance the river.
Attendees can register for one or both
days of the conference, and discounted
fees are available for students.
For further details and registration, visit
riveraction.org.
Survey shows low prices,
tariffs could shift acres
to corn and wheat
Farmers starting to pencil out options
for 2019 crops don’t have many obvious
choices in a year dominated by trade
disputes, good yields and low prices. But
like it or not, growers are starting to place
their bets for the coming year, according
to Farm Futures first survey of 2019 planting
intentions. Results of the survey were
released in late August at the Farm Progress
Show, the nation’s largest outdoor
farm show, in Boone, Iowa.
China’s 25 percent tariff on imports of
U.S. soybeans helped pummel prices
headed into harvest, and a record crop
didn’t help the market, either. So, growers
said they plan to trim seedings by 2 million
acres next spring. That would take soybean
acreage to 87.5 million, compared to
the 89.6 million put in the ground this year,
a decrease of 2.3 percent.
Many of those acres would shift to corn,
helping realign rotations after soybean
plantings topped corn for the first time in
a generation
in 2018. Corn
could face
brighter price prospects headed into 2019,
too, giving growers faith to raise corn
seedings by 1.7 million to 90.8 million
acres. That would be an increase of just
under 2 percent compared to this spring.
Global corn stocks are tightening due
to weather problems overseas that also
hurt wheat production in other exporting
countries. Winter wheat futures led a brief
price rebound this summer, which appears
to be bringing more land into production
as growers seed fields this fall.
The survey found farmers ready to
put in 33.6 million acres of winter wheat,
up nearly 850,000 from a year ago, an
increase of 2.6 percent. Farmers indicated
they would seed around 4 percent more
hard red and soft red winter wheat, while
reducing white wheat acreage.
Over the past 11 years the average
difference between Farm Futures August
intentions and USDA’s Prospective Plantings
the following March is 1.5 percent for
corn and 2.5 percent for soybeans.
Farm Futures surveyed 924 growers
July 20 to August 2. Farmers were invited
by email to complete an on-line questionnaire.
Practical Farmers of Iowa
sets annual conference
The 2019 Practical Farmers of Iowa
Annual Conference will be held Jan. 17-19
at the Scheman Building
in Ames.
For more information
about being a sponsor
or exhibitor, please email
Kathy Eastman at keastman33@gmail.com.
The conference is
open to everyone and
attracts farmers of all
sorts, sizes, systems and enterprises, as
well as non-farmers interested in knowing
more about how their food is grown and
building relationships between those who
work the land and those who rely on their
labors.
The conference allows time for networking
and interacting with sponsors.
Practical Farmers represents a diverse
network of farmers, including those who
raise corn and soybeans, hay, livestock
large and small, horticultural crops from
fruits and vegetables to cut flowers and
herbs. The organization formed in 1985.
For more information, visit practicalfarmers.org.
New initiative formed
to empower rural Iowa
Iowa recently launched the Empower
Rural Iowa Initiative bringing the Governor’s
office together with the Rural Development
Council to identify legislative,
regulatory and policy changes that could
benefit small towns and rural areas.
Empower Rural Iowa has 66 appointed
members from across the state, each of
whom sought the opportunity to serve,
according to Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds.
Recommendations will be provided by
an executive committee and three task
forces: Investing in Rural Iowa, Growing
Rural Iowa, and Connecting Rural Iowa.
The Investing in Rural Iowa task force
will focus on improving access to quality
housing in rural Iowa. The Growing
Rural Iowa task force will identify ways to
encourage leadership development and
strategic development in rural communities.
The Connecting Rural Iowa task
force will look into effectively and sustainably
financing broadband connectivity.
The task forces will begin meeting this
fall. Initial recommendations will be due by
the end of the year so they can be considered
during the 2019 legislative session.
Eerie Adventures Day
Camp set for kids
The ISU Extension Office will hold an
Eerie Adventures Day Camp from 8 a.m.
to 3 p.m. Oct. 19 at the Clinton County
Fairgrounds Auditorium. Kids will enjoy
Ooey, Gooey Frankenstein snot (slime),
Jumping Spider Rockets, Monster Trick
or Treat Box, Pumpkin Bowling and more.
This program is for kids in kindergarten
through third grade. Cost is $40 for 4-H
members and $45 for nonmembers. Morning
and afternoon snack are provided participants
should bring a lunch. Registration
and payment are due at the extension
office by Wednesday, Oct. 17.
132 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

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WARREN MOELLER IS THE
KING
OF KINGS
Barbeque champion earns
state fair title, reclaims
status in friendly cookoff
BY NANCY MAYFIELD
EASTERN IOWA FARMER
It was a warm Saturday
morning in June,
and Warren Moeller
hadn’t slept all night.
While a line of thunderstorms had pummeled Bellevue in the
late evening the day before and into the early morning, he’d kept
the fire going on the smoker set up in the parking lot of Country
Side Feed & Supply, a business which he recently acquired.
Moeller, who also owns PMC Agri-Service in Miles, started the
smoker at 11 p.m. the night before to cook beef brisket and pork
ribs for customers to celebrate the store’s grand opening under
new ownership.

EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / TREVIS MAYFIELD

KING OF KINGS
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Customers at Country Side Feed & Seed in Bellevue were treated earlier this summer to some mouthwatering ribs and brisket that owner Warren
Moeller prepared in the parking lot. Moeller is an award-winning BBQ cook in Iowa, earning the title of “King of Kings” in a statewide contest. BBQ
can be a little messy, but the end product is worth it after being cooked all night long.
Sometimes it was raining so hard,
he could barely see the cooker to load
more wood into it. But when you’re
smoking meat, it is crucial to keep
a constant heat at a certain temperature
range, about 200 to 225 degrees.
So, rain or no rain, Moeller reloaded
every two hours.
“The key is to cook it low and
slow,” he said, taking a break from
the work to share some mouth-watering
samples of his labor with guests
while the smell of hickory hung thick
n See
Warren’s
receipes
on page
140
in the air.
That’s what you do
when you’re a barbecue
king. And he has the
crown to prove it.
In 1996 Moeller
earned the title of the Iowa Farm
Bureau’s 33rd cookout champion at
the Iowa State Fair with his recipe for
Old Style Chicken.
It was his third try. The first year he
made pork ribs and came in second
overall. The second year he made
beef brisket and again came in second
overall. He switched gears to win
the elusive first place, deciding to try
“something new” he’d heard about
that today is very mainstream – beer
Thank You, Farmers!
bellevue state bank thanks and recognizes all those who work hard
to feed everyone around the globe. you spend long hours in the fields,
sacrfice family time, and juggle budgets, markets, animal care,
and so much more. we appreicate your dedication to farming.
Member
FDIC
BELLEVUE
state bank
locally owned since 1934
ppeterson@bellevuestatebank.com
rprull@bellevuestatebank.com
Paul Peterson
Executive Vice President
200 S. 2nd St., Bellevue, IA
Office: 563-872-4911 • Fax : 563-872-4198
Rick Prull
Vice President
136 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

Mission:
To create a vibrant future for agriculture,
farm families and their communities.
LegisLation
connecting with elected
officials about rural and
agricultural issues
FinanCiaL support
Contributing to projects in our
local schools and communities
supporting stuDent athLetes
Proud to recognize our local student athletes who work hard
on and off the courts and classrooms.
to Join Farm Bureau contact your county oFFice today
clinton county
Farm Bureau
Jackson county
Farm Bureau
Jones county
Farm Bureau
cedar county
Farm Bureau
duBuque county
Farm Bureau
Clinton.County@ifbf.org
563-659-5134
Jackson.County@ifbf.org
563-652-2456
Jones.County@ifbf.org
319-462-4805
Cedar.County@ifbf.org
563-886-3109
Dubuque.County@ifbf.org
563-556-5275

KING OF KINGS
can chicken. That recipe did the trick,
as the judges raved about the flavor
and golden brown color thanks to his
special horseradish glaze.
Moeller
laughed at the
irony that a
farmer who was
raising pork
“The only
thing I cooked
as a kid was
grilled cheese
sandwich.”
— WARREN MOELLER
and beef finally
won the contest
cooking chicken.
Winners of
that contest
can’t compete
in it again. But
about two years
later, some
of the former
winners wanted
a chance to cook competitively once
more. So, in a sort of Iron Chef version
of the contest, they challenged
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / TREVIS MAYFIELD
Warren and Michelle Moeller became interested in barbequing technique years ago when they
went camping with friends in Texas, and BBQ was often on the menu.
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138 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

KING OF KINGS
each other to a cookoff.
The beer can chicken won
again, making Moeller the
“King of Kings.”
His daughter Erin brings
out a bag full of purple
ribbons as testimony to
Moeller’s cooking expertise.
There’s best of show
and first places from the
Lynch Livestock Stampede,
the Mt. Carroll Brick Street
Cook Off, the Jackson
County Fair Open Class,
and the list goes on. And
then she pulls out the King
of Kings crown, blue-velvet
with gold accents.
Sitting on a low concrete
porch among bags of feed,
he took a break from the
cooking to talk about his
long history with barbecue.
He and his wife Michelle
went camping with friends
in Texas, and barbecue was
often on the menu.
“I watched and learned,”
he said.
His first cooker was a
stainless-steel tank that
looked like a pig.
“We called it the silver
sow,” he said. He’s on his
third cooker now, a sleek
smoker from Sling-N-
Steel that he’d driven up
from Kentucky just a week
before. It has a smoker
system, a charcoal grill and
a rib box. The open house
was its inaugural use.
“There’s so many different
varieties of cookers.
When you use one long
enough, you know what
you’re looking for,” he
said.
Moeller said he learned
from his grandpa that it’s
best to use a base wood to
create the heat and then a
different wood for flavor.
Moeller’s choice of base
wood is red oak. For flavor,
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO /
TREVIS MAYFIELD
Warren Moeller exhibits the
mouth-watering final product —
meat slow-cooked all night long.
Moeller said it’s best to use a
base wood to create the heat and
then a different wood for flavor.
Moeller’s choice of base wood
is red oak. For flavor, he adds
hickory wood.
he adds hickory.
While he used to compete
regularly, once his kids
Garrett and Erin started
sports and 4-H, he spent
his evenings and weekends
attending their events.
“I still like to go to
contests and see how other
people do stuff,” he said. At
one point, he and Michelle
even bottled and sold their
own barbecue sauce – River
City Smokers. It’s now
retired.
For the man who’s barbecued
bear, pigeon, alligator
and raccoon in addition to
beef, pork and chicken, the
road to BBQ royalty started
humbly.
“The only thing I
cooked as a kid,” Moeller
said, “was grilled cheese
sandwich.” n
in case there is not enough
corn on your farm...
Scarecrows are always
outstanding in their
field...
But HAY, it’s in their JEANS!
How did the farmer
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What do you get when
a chicken lays an egg
on top of a barn?
An eggroll!
Did you hear about
the magic tractor?
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Lumber
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It turned into a field!
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Lumber
563-652-5155
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Serving Clinton, Dubuque, Jackson and Jones
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eifarmer.com FALL 2018 | EASTERN IOWA FARMER 139

Warren’s Barbecue Tips
• Take your time
• Start with the rub and let it soak
in for as long as you can/want
• Go with the flavor that you like.
Not everybody’s tastes are the same
Rub
½ cup brown sugar
¼ cup paprika
1 Tablespoon black pepper
1 Tablespoon salt
1 Tablespoon chili powder
1 Tablespoon garlic powder
1 Tablespoon onion powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Mix all ingredients together
Beer-Butt Chicken
1 3- to 5-pound chicken
1 can of beer at room temperature
Seasoning of your choice
Open beer and place chicken over the beer so it
stands up. Place on a heated grill or smoker. If
using a grill, use indirect heat. Do not place the
chicken right over the charcoal. Grill for a couple
of hours or until golden brown and the right internal
temperature. Remove from grill or smoker
and let rest for 10 to 15 minutes before carving.
Smoked Bourbon
Apple Crisp
Filling
3 pounds Granny Smith
Apples or Honey Crisp apples
peeled and sliced thin
½ cup brown sugar, firmly packed
¼ cup honey
2½ Tablespoon bourbon
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
1½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
pinch of salt
Topping
KING OF KINGS
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
½ cup flour
½ cup old-fashioned oats
¼ cup walnuts (optional)
1½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 stick of salted butter, chilled and
cut into ½-inch cubes
Generously butter the inside of a 12-inch
cast iron skillet and set aside. In a bowl,
combine the brown sugar, flour, oats,
walnuts, cinnamon and butter. You may
use a food processor to mix the topping.
Combine until mixture is crumbly.
In large mixing bowl combine the
apples, brown sugar, honey, bourbon,
lemon juice, cinnamon, vanilla and salt.
Stir gently to combine.
Pour the fruit mixture into the buttered
skillet. Drop the topping evenly over
the top of the fruit. Place in smoker and
smoke at 350 degrees for one hour or
until the topping is golden brown, and
the fruit is hot and bubbly. Let cool for 30
minutes.
Baked Beans
1 gallon of Bush’s Baked Beans
1 medium to large onion diced
1 large green pepper diced
1 cup of brown sugar
1 cup of barbecue sauce—I use
Countryside from Fareway
1 pound bacon, fried and chopped
Fry bacon and chop in smaller pieces.
Sauté onion and green pepper in the
leftover bacon grease till soft.
Put beans in a baking dish and add the
other ingredients. Bake in a 350-degree
oven for at least an hour and a half.
SERVICE IS OUR NO. 1 PRIORITY!
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Maquoketa Service Team
Through rain or shine, from planting to harvest, Roeder Brothers
has been committed to keeping farmers in the fields since 1938.
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140 EASTERN IOWA FARMER | FALL 2018 eifarmer.com

Trucking
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Pictured,
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Dan Arensdorf,
Bill Moeller,
Brandon
Arensdorf,
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and Drew
Arensdorf.
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(Above) Jake Redling helps an abandoned bull calf gain a
little extra nutrition by bottle feeding it.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / BROOKE TAYLOR
(Top middle) A vibrant rainbow makes an appearance over
the Duhme Farms located in rural Maquoketa.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / KELLY DUHME LAUGESEN
(Right) Gavin Regenwether’s natural curiosity and love for
tractors led him to this International Harvester sitting under
a tree on the Jim and Lori Evilsizer Century Farm a couple
miles west of Spragueville.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / KELLY GERLACH
(Below) Chillin’ in the pool: A herd of cattle beat 100-degree
temperatures by dipping their hooves in a creek in rural
Jackson County.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / KELLY GERLACH

(Above) Jackson County farmer Brian Tabor gets a
plateful of food from Jennifer Turner and Theresa
Weiss when the Natural Resources Conservation
Service hosted a grazing workshop for Jackson
and surrounding county producers. Over 80 people
attended the workshop to learn more about grazing
practices and how to regenerate their pastures.
(Left) Merwin Koch, a retired farmer from Maquoketa,
stops by Highway 64 Auctions on a sunny, but windy,
Saturday in March to chat with owner Mike Franzen.
Koch, who had a tractor for sale on the lot, now works
part-time for Eberhart Farm Center in Maquoketa
during busy seasons.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / TREVIS MAYFIELD

AT THE FAIR!
(Top) Mary Holtz leads her cow from
the wash rack before exhibiting it at the fair.
(Above left) Hunter Schwoob listens to comments about his
mini lop rabbit given by Judge Steve Zaruba during the 4-H
Rabbit Show.
(Above right) Members of the Jackson County Pork
Producers wrangle hogs for 4-H and FFA members during
the hog show at the Jackson County Fair.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / KELLY GERLACH
(Left) Eli, 4, and Chaz Engelkes are equally excited about
the corn dogs at the Jackson County Fair in Maquoketa.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTO / JANE SCHMIDT

(Far left) Hannah Burken of Clinton enjoys some chocolate milk, one of the
featured drinks of the evening at the Jackson/Clinton County Dairy Banquet
on Feb. 24 at the Jackson County Fairgrounds.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / TREVIS MAYFIELD
(Middle left) Aiden Weis gets a little camera shy during the annual Clinton/
Jackson Dairy Banquet. His family won the Most Improved Supervised Herd.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / TREVIS MAYFIELD
(Left) Oliver, 5, and his dad Mike Ahrendsen check out the scenery at their
new place in Jones County.
EASTERN IOWA FARMER PHOTOS / BROOKE TAYLOR
(Above) Ruth
and Yogi Braet of
Calamus stand
next to their
collection of IH
tractors.
EASTERN IOWA
FARMER PHOTO /
BROOKE TAYLOR
(Left) Jack Buck,
3, is all ears as
uncle Cameron
Sorgenfrey
shares a lesson
on measuring
seed depth on the
Sorgenfrey farm
near Wyoming.
EASTERN IOWA
FARMER PHOTO /
KIM SORGENFREY

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