The Hoosier Farmer

One question that I often get asked is, “What is your favorite part of working for Indiana Farm Bureau?”

Even after three decades, that’s an easy one. My very favorite thing about working here is – and has always been – getting out in the counties, interviewing members about their lives, families and farms, and writing articles that introduce those members to the readers of The Hoosier Farmer.

By the time you receive this issue, I will be one of that special class of people known as “retirees.” My official last day was Dec. 1, 2025, and because I started Nov. 29, 1995, this means that at retirement, I will have worked for INFB for 30 years and two days.

It’s been a great 30 years (and two days). And because it’s given me an opportunity to share the stories of many wonderful and witty people, I thought I’d use this farewell column to look back on just a few of those stories. Some of them were written when The Hoosier Farmer was a magazine and some since it became a monthly newspaper, but in all cases, I felt as though I was being given a very special gift. I hope I was able to give THF readers some little gifts, too.

An early favorite of mine is the story about Jim Campbell of Morgan County, founder of the Mild to Wild Pepper & Herb Company and grower of peppers – some fairly hot and some extraordinarily hot (THF, winter 2001). He made his peppers into sauces, and that included his spiciest pepper, the Red Savina habanero.

On an impulse, I asked him if he’d ever made a grown man cry.

“All the time,” Campbell said. Decades later, that line still cracks me up.

Of course, it’s not all laughs in the news business. I have vivid recollections of covering some of agriculture’s weather disasters, including the 2012 drought, which in some parts of Indiana produced the driest June on record. In 2013 we did a series of articles about the continuing effect of the drought on different segments of Indiana agriculture, and I particularly remember interviewing Morgan County cattleman Jim Lankford and Spencer County hog producer Bill Tempel (THF, April 29, 2013).

“I’m not sure what normal is any more. It seems like we go from one extreme to the other,” Lankford said. “There is no ‘normal’ here,” Tempel added.

Another decidedly unfunny topic is fuel prices. In May 2022, when the Ukraine war and COVID-related production lags caused fuel prices to skyrocket, Mark Bacon of Rush County summarized it this way: “A year ago, $80 or $90 would fill up my truck, but it was $142 when I filled it up yesterday.”

The Hoosier Farmer has given me opportunities to interview some notable people. In 2011, I interviewed a major food/agricultural celebrity: Ree Drummond, also known as The Pioneer Woman. Drummond and her husband operate a ranch in Oklahoma, but Drummond stars in her own “Food Network” show, has written many cookbooks, and still writes a blog that is read by millions of people. It was a lovely interview, but it also included some excellent advice for writers: “You definitely have to be yourself in your writing, no matter what ‘yourself’ is, and that’ll come through.” I’ve tried to take that to heart.

I can’t resist including one more quote, this one from the summer 2007 issue, which focused on two Hoosier obsessions: tenderloins and ice cream. We asked readers for their favorite tenderloin, favorite ice cream flavor, etc. The most memorable submissions came in response to a question about oddest flavor of ice cream readers had tasted, which included (not kidding) green bean, onion, elderberry and… lobster.

Unlikely as it seems, there may be something worse than lobster ice cream. One respondent vividly remembered a cherry milkshake she’d had in 1956. "It tasted like fingernail polish remover," she explained.

That’s just a tiny sample of some of the wonderful stories I have been able to share. I’d like to thank the officers, staff and – most of all – the members of Indiana Farm Bureau for allowing me the privilege of bringing these stories to you for 30 years.

Kathleen Dutro takes photos of El Malpais National Monument in New Mexico while on vacation. 

Contact Editor

Robert Herrington

(317) 692-7871

RHerrington@infb.org