Site icon Farming w/ the Stauffers

They do not make them like that anymore

Krista Stauffer

I got the kids ready and we headed to church. My husband couldn’t make it because we had someone on his way to look at some of our heifers. He is supposed to be retiring and in fact had a retirement party several years ago. Instead, he was having his grandson drive him to our farm to look at our animals.

Once church was over we headed home. As the kids & I pulled up to the farm we saw them out in the field looking at our girls. I felt the tears coming but I held them back. Once they were done looking, they came inside to get out of the cold. My husband offered him coffee but he preferred hot cocoa.

He sat there discussing the deal he had just made with my husband. They confirmed the amount of animals and the price. He then asked for a piece of paper. He took those numbers and figured everything out long hand and then double checked it. They made some final agreements and he took out his checkbook. He said that he had Parkinson’s. To be honest, I couldn’t tell. To me he was just an older man still doing what he loved. I see it often with men in agriculture. They love it & they cannot let it go. It broke my heart when he said that.  He wrote the amount on his check, filled out the memo portion & had me do the rest. His hands were shaky & that is when I began to see the effects of what he had just told me.

My husband asked him, “How old are you now?” He has no problem asking people those kinds of questions. I do. He responded, “82 years old”. He told us how he moved from Nebraska in 1938 with nothing. We talked about the price of land when he was younger compared to what it is today. He shared a few other stories with us.

He told us that he keeps doing what he is doing because he knows how hard it is for the small dairy farmers. Well, farmers in general. We had purchased animals from him several times before. The third time he allowed us to make payments on those animals. He gave us an opportunity to shake his hand & prove to him that we would honor our word. That to me is priceless.

We sat there and talked for a little bit as he sipped his hot chocolate. I wanted to know where our animals were going. Of course I wanted to know where our animals were going & he was happy to provide me with that information. As much as we love our girls, this is still a business. In this business when you have too many animals you need to sell them. This was the first time he would be purchasing animals from our farm. We talked about things that have happened in his life & so on. There were a few times I had to hold back the tears. Married to the same woman for over 60 years & still working at 82. He has been one of the few men that have given us a chance.

He finished up his hot cocoa and headed on his way home. A couple days later we sent our girls to his place. I held back the tears as we loaded our girls onto the trailer and I cried as the trailer left the driveway. You see, they are more than just cows to us. They provide a roof over our head, food on our table and clothes on our backs. They make us smile, they make us cry and sometimes they just flat break our hearts. They push us to constantly do a better job. They are teaching our children how to work hard and respect animals. On that trailer left some girls carrying memories of the past five years on this farm.

It is men like him that built this country. It is men like him that I just want to sit down with hot cocoa and talk to all day long! We (as in you & I) should be grateful for him & his generation. We should be grateful because this country is what it is today because of previous generations working their backside off! Hard work, work ethic, faithfulness and helping a fellow neighbor (or farmer) is what we need in this country. We need to bring that back to America. Americans that are not afraid to take risks, get their hands dirty, work from sun up to sun down, stand up for what they believe in, work for what they have, etc. That is what America needs.

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Krista Stauffer

Owner at Stauffer Dairy
Krista didn't grow up on a farm but fell in love with a dairy farmer and now works alongside her husband on their family dairy farm, raising five children. Despite her non-farm upbringing, she embraces farm life, enjoys gardening, and remodeling their farmhouse. She also runs a successful women's boutique, manages social media for local businesses, and serves on the board of a non-profit creamery, showcasing her dedication to entrepreneurship and community service.
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