MARIETTA, Ill. (February 28, 2022) – Four Illinois producers will be honored as 2022 Master Farmers at Prairie Farmer magazine’s annual event in Springfield, Ill., on Thursday, March 17. The award recognizes exceptional agricultural production skills, commitment to family and service to community.
The 2022 Master Farmers are:
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Darryl Brinkmann, Carlyle
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Jim Raben, Ridgway
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Doug Schroeder, Mahomet
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Curt Zehr, Washington
Look for profiles of each winner in the March 2022 Prairie Farmer and online at PrairieFarmer.com during the week of Feb. 28.
“The Master Farmer award is Illinois agriculture’s lifetime achievement award,” says Holly Spangler, Prairie Farmer editor. “These farmers are at the top of their game, and they’ve received this award because they raise good crops and even better families, and they’ve built their communities along the way.”
Prairie Farmer first offered the Master Farmer award 97 years ago, in 1925. Editors have continued the tradition annually since 1968, following a pause initially caused by the Depression. When Editor Clifford Gregory established the Master Farmer program, he felt the award would help give farm people a greater sense of “pride and permanence.” Nearly 350 Illinois producers have been inducted as Master Farmers or Honorary Master Farmers over the program’s history.
Candidates are nominated by farmers, neighbors, agribusiness leaders and farm organizations throughout the state. Judges for the 2022 awards were Karen Corrigan, McGillicuddy Corrigan Agronomics; Ed McMillan, former University of Illinois board of trustees; Linnea Kooistra, 2011 Master Farmer; Dwight Raab, First Midwest Bank agribusiness vice president; Steve Carson, Farm Credit Illinois; and Holly Spangler, Prairie Farmer editor.
Some Master Farmers serve in state and national farm leadership positions. Others chair prestigious boards or serve with honor at the highest levels of government. Still others build their farms or businesses to regional or national prominence.
However, all serve their communities — building churches, chairing little-known but important committees, raising money for children’s organizations — and continue the service-minded commitment that earned them the Master Farmer distinction in the first place.
“There’s a saying that if you want something done, ask a busy person to do it – because they’ll get it done,” Spangler says. “These four Master Farmers are busy people who just keep finding more capacity to give back and work hard. They’re leveraging every ounce of skill they have for the greater good.”
Prairie Farmer is published 11 times a year for Illinois farm families. Established in 1841, it is the oldest continuously published farm periodical in the United States. GROWMARK Inc. is a financial sponsor of the award. Like the Master Farmer award, the GROWMARK system was born during the 1920s, when farmer cooperatives first organized the Illinois Farm Supply Co. Today, the brand is known as FS.
To nominate a farmer for the 2023 Master Farmer award, email holly.spangler@farmprogress.com or go to FarmProgress.com/prairie-master-farmer.
To download high-resolution photos of the group and of individual Master Farmers, please go to:
https://www.farmprogress.com/master-farmers/prairie-farmer-master-farmer-photos
MASTER FARMER PROFILES AND CONTACT INFORMATION
DARRYL BRINKMANN: LEADING WITH PURPOSE
It was May of 1981 when Darryl Brinkmann graduated with an agriculture economics degree from the University of Illinois and came back home to work on the farm full time. This made Darryl, now a 2022 Prairie Farmer Master Farmer, the third generation to join the farm.
“I don't ever hate getting up in the morning and going out to farm,” Darryl says. “I like what I'm doing and I'm not counting the days to retirement.”
To help make room on the then-560-acre operation for Darryl, his father, Willard, retired from the livestock operation and Darryl created a partnership with his younger brother, Kent, using their father’s facilities to finish nearly 100 head of beef cattle and 400 hogs.
Darryl married Jean in 1990. The couple has one daughter: Danielle Brinkmann, 24.
Over the years, the brothers have inherited, bought and rented farmland together, while also buying land separately. Today, Darryl’s portion of the operation includes 930 tillable acres. Plus, he helps with the daily chores of Danielle’s 30-head Angus cattle herd while she is away from the farm.
“Darryl has excelled with his farming operation, in his engagement and association with his community, as well as his devotion and stewardship of being called to provide leadership to the organizations with which he is associated,” says Greg Webb, ADM state government relations vice president, who worked with Darryl through the Illinois Soybean Association.
Over the last five years, Darryl began experimenting with cover crops, specifically cereal rye and crimson clover, as a conservation measure on his farm.
“I do like the appearance of a growing crop over the winter, and such growth does reduce erosion,” he says. “I feel a responsibility to be a good environmental steward while conserving soil and water.”
Darryl was nominated by 2001 Master Farmer Philip Nelson.
Photo caption: Darryl Brinkmann
For more information, contact:
Darryl Brinkmann
618-920-0386 (cell)
JIM RABEN: CROSSING BORDERS
Jim Raben has been involved in the family farm his entire life, but it was 1974 when his dad became ill and Jim left his agriculture teacher position at Mount Vernon High School to return to the family farm full time.
“Farming full time was probably always something in my future to start with, but the time to come back was then,” says Jim, a 2022 Master Farmer who farms near Ridgway, Ill. “It was really hard to leave the ag program I had built up into a two-man teacher program and not being able to be a part of it more.”
At that point, Jim’s father owned 2,000 acres near Ridgway. Jim also was farming 100 acres of his own that he purchased while still teaching high school ag. He was the fourth generation to join the family farm, and married Marilyn in 1975. The couple has four children and nine grandchildren.
After his father passed away in 2006, Jim and his brother, Bill, who was named a Prairie Farmer Master Farmer in 2016, inherited their father’s 2,000 acres. Over the years, Jim has worked hard to purchase more farmland. Today, the farm consists of nearly 7,500 acres of corn and soybeans here in Illinois, and 800 acres in Arkansas, which rotates between sweet potatoes and corn.
Sons Matt and Joe both hold jobs in the ag industry and work on the farm part time, using their experiences to help Jim make operation decisions. Daughters Christina and Jordan help on the farm when they can.
Jim’s educational background in ag economics has helped shape his philosophy on farm expansion: If you can buy ground, buy it, because you don’t know what it will be worth in the future.
Jim is chairman of the U.S. Grains Council, was chairman of the Illinois Corn Marketing Board, and has served the local school board, the Gallatin County Farm Bureau board and many others.
Jim was nominated by IL Corn.
Photo caption: Jim Raben
For more information, contact:
Jim Raben
812-455-5621 (cell)
618-272-7452 (home)
DOUG SCHROEDER: FAITH, FAMILY AND FARMING
Doug Schroeder took his college professor’s question seriously: “How are you gonna farm better than the guy across the road?” Forty years and forty crops later, Doug says he’s never forgotten that question. And he’s worked hard at the answer.
“Back in the day, we no-tilled. Later we tiled and improved the land. Today it’s drainage tile, seed production and non-GM corn. No matter what, you have to figure out how you’re going to do it better,” says the 2022 Prairie Farmer Master Farmer from Mahomet, Ill.
Doug started farming with his father and brother following his 1983 University of Illinois graduation. Since then, he’s grown the operation from 800 acres to 5,400 acres. And while he and his father began farming together, today the operation includes the next generation: son Bob Schroeder and son-in-law Matt Turner.
“Slow and steady growth adds up over time,” Doug says.
The Schroeders were early adopters of no-till soybeans and strip till corn and continued to no-till for 10 years. Yield mapping showed a small amount of tillage increased yields substantially. So they switched to minimum tillage, and still analyze every tillage pass to make sure it’s necessary. They’ve also pattern-tiled 3,500 acres over the past 10 years, laying nearly 2 million feet of drainage tile themselves, often with water control devices.
Doug most recently served as president of the Illinois Soybean Association, steering the organization through the hiring process of a new executive director. Back home, he and wife Stacy raise funds for an annual youth fundraiser, and he manages assets for a child welfare organization and serves many other local groups, as well. They have three children and four grandchildren.
Their mission is clear, right on the back of their farm sweatshirts: “Faith, family, farming.”
“That’s one of the things we’re really proud of on our farm,” Doug says. “It’s been a fun ride.”
Doug was nominated by the Illinois Soybean Association.
Photo caption: Doug Schroeder
For more information, contact:
Doug Schroeder
217-202-3066 (cell)
CURT ZEHR: PEOPLE AND PORK
Curt Zehr loves farming – and pigs – so much that he skipped school on the first day of kindergarten to show pigs. And ever since, he’s been in the barn raising hogs. And then he started selling meat.
“It’s a big deal to be a part of somebody’s Christmas dinner when they use a Zehr Farms ham,” says the 2022 Master Farmer from Washington, Ill.
Curt farms with the help of his wife, Sue, who acts as comptroller for the farm and manages their branded meat business, and longtime employee Kevin Balducci, plus seasonal help. Their operation is divided into four profit centers: grain, market hogs, local branded meat and internationally marketed genetics.
Curt started farming full time with his father and grandfather following his graduation from Goshen College and the University of Illinois in 1981. Initially, he rented 150 acres from his grandfather and traded labor for machinery use for a couple of years, until he and his dad, Dean, formed a partnership. Over the years, the father and son gradually transferred more of the partnership to Curt.
On the hog side of his operation, Curt has embraced three different production strategies. They operate a 140-head farrow-to-finish Duroc herd, producing 2,500 pigs per year. They also sell branded meat in central Illinois as Zehr Premium Pork, and they market their Duroc-based genetics through the U.S. as Zehr Farms Genetics.
“This award is a recognition not only of what I’ve done, but of what my father and grandfather and great-grandfather have done,” Curt says. “I didn’t start this. Hopefully I’ve built on it. They afforded me the opportunity to farm.
Curt and Sue were honored as the Illinois Pork Producers Family of the Year in 2017, and Curt was also inducted into the Illinois Purebred Breeders Hall of Fame in 2016. He served as 2015 president of Illinois Pork Producers, and volunteers throughout his community.
Curt was nominated by the Illinois Pork Producers Association.
Photo caption: Curt Zehr
For more information, contact:
Curt Zehr
309-251-7447 (cell)
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