Cowboy In the Jungle

Trying to decide what you’re going to do for the rest of your life is not an easy decision to make, but that was what I was doing in an Agricultural Analysis classroom at Arizona State University. My instructor had given me an assignment to write a five page double spaced typed paper informing him as to who I was, where I was from, what I wanted to do with my life, where I was in my life, and what was my greatest personal asset? I told him I was Hank Stuart from Valentine, Nebraska. I told him I wanted to feed people. Feeding people has always been important in this world. Where was I in my life? I told him I was pitching in the third inning. I like baseball, so I used that as a metaphor. I told him I had a good fastball, curve, slider, and that I used a forkball for a change-up. I told him that I had gotten into the third inning without too much difficulty and I looked forward to going the full nine innings. And what was my greatest personal asset? I told him that I knew what I knew and I knew what I didn’t know. And what did I know? I know cows! And if you want to talk cows all day – I’ll listen. And if you want to listen – then I’ll talk! And what did I not know? I didn’t know how or if the world was going to feed itself over the next thirty or forty years. Whether or not it could, seemed like a pretty important question to me. And that was another reason that I was working on a Master’s Degree in International Agriculture at Arizona State University. ‘Don’t cha know,’ was Professor Calvert’s favorite expression. He used it often. And he used it on this day to conclude his remarks about American agricultural history in the twentieth century. “Don’t cha know that agriculture has changed much since my days as a senior at Kentucky State College. From an era of a labor intensive lifestyle where families worked nearly every available moment just to eke out an existence, we’ve evolved into a capital intensive system. The modern day farm and ranch utilizes inputs never dreamed of by my college instructors. From a low level educated operator of the past, the modern day operator has been transformed into a highly technical, sophisticated, multi-faceted manager. Expertise is the call word for today’s agriculture. One person – as an individual alone - cannot survive in this business of farming today. He needs the trained mechanical capabilities of someone who can understand the complexities of modern machinery. He needs the assistance and knowledge of agronomists, plant breeders and soil scientists who can diagnose the ever changing environment of a crop. And an agricultural business man of today needs to feel just as comfortable behind his desk planning his cash flow for the year, as he does behind the steering wheel of a tractor or combine. And he needs to be familiar with the demands of the banking world. No longer is the farmer of today on a cash system of operation, but instead he is using someone else’s money for his operation, planning and expansion. My father, when he began farming at your age in the hill region of western Kentucky where the Tennessee River meets the Ohio, would put a twenty dollar bill into the family cookie jar on the kitchen table for his spring farming expenses. With that same twenty dollars he would plant his entire crop. It would fix the harness, shod the horses, sharpen the plow shears and buy a little extra labor. Today, twenty dollars can’t pay for the herbicide for a single acre of cotton and it can’t pay for the diesel fuel consumed by a tractor during a day of use. Yes, don’t cha know that the face of agriculture in America has changed a great deal in my lifetime and it will continue to change and even more rapidly in your life-time.” With that statement, Professor Calvert had finished his class summary before the bell. He then reminded us of the upcoming test on Friday. A couple hands went up with questions. They came from girls who I presumed to be favorite students of Calvert’s. Calvert answered the questions professionally and academically, but I had considered the questions a waste of classroom time. It was summer school at Arizona State. I was new on campus and everything about Arizona was new to me. And I was new to Calvert. That was why he had given me my five page assignment. Calvert wanted to know who his students were. My paper would not be graded or returned, but placed into Calvert’s filing cabinet for his own future reference. It was an assignment he gave to every one of his new students.