Re: We Are Too DumbTo Make A Living Farming

Posted by Bill Radford on September 13, 2013 at 08:35:04 from (199.90.157.10):

In Reply to: We Are Too DumbTo Make A Living Farming posted by 2badlybent on September 13, 2013 at 08:05:38:

I was raised on a small tobacco farm. All of my family on both sides were farmers. My father loved farming, but also had a "town job".He was at one time the service/parts manager of a Farmall dealership, but in the late 50's because of his wartime service and continuation with the USAF reserves got the opportunity to be a parts man on a much bigger scale in charge of an aviation parts depot at a major Air Force facility. As a result, he basically held two jobs while I was growing up: One as a civilian employee of the USAF and the other as a tobacco farmer.
My dad understood what a lot of you older fellows here on the forum do: its not how new or nice your equipment looks, but how much stays in your hands after the tobacco is sold and the corn is picked in the fall.
I was expected to be his full-time hired hand while he was off at work. Unlike a lot of my contemporaries, I was expected to do the work and have the responsibility of an adult at an early age and I feel that this stood me in good stead later on in life.
This was hard work, and it made me determined to get an education, not so that I would not have to farm, but so that I would have options to have a steady off-farm income if I chose to farm.
Life led me away from the farm and as a result of my career I have never had the time to get into farming like my dad did. However, I have held on to the family farm land and even managed to add a little on to it. I have a good farmer that tends my land. He does a very good job and I have always been reasonable re: rent. Both of us have been happy.
I realize that farming today involves risk, financial committment and effort that I am not able to give with the demands of my professional career,but I enjoy the tractor hobby as a way to keep in touch with my roots in farming and to enjoy "mechanicing".
Unlike a lot of my generation, I will not sell any of my land for cheap houses to be built on. Like Dad said: "they aint' making anymore of it...EVER "
I may work in a different environment and work in a white coat and scrubs instead of blue jeans,but I am down deep a farmer and never consider myself to be anything other.I have been there and done that and I'm proud of it.

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