Wisconsin’s Shrine to Dairy Cows : Top Milk-Producing State Is Tribute to One Man’s Effort

This small town is the mecca for dairy farmers from throughout the world.

Dairymen, women and children from all 50 states, from Canada, Latin America, Europe, Asia, Africa, India, the near East and Australia-New Zealand make pilgrimages here each year.

They come to visit the most famous dairy farm on earth, to visit a shrine to the cow, to visit Hoard’s Dairyman, the bible of the dairy industry, a century-old, semi-monthly publication devoted to all facets of dairying.

And, they come to honor the memory of William Dempster Hoard (1836-1918), Wisconsin’s 19th-Century “Cow Governor” called the “Apostle of the Dairy Cow” and the father of modern dairying.

Wisconsin, America’s leading dairy state producing 17.4% of the nation’s milk and 36.3% of the country’s cheese, holds that distinction because of Hoard.

“America’s dairyland” Wisconsin vehicle license plates proclaim. “Thanks to W. O. Hoard,” might well be added.

From Wheat to Dairying

For it was Hoard who moved to the Midwest state from his native New York after service as a soldier in the Civil War and campaigned to get Wisconsin farmers to convert from producing thin stands of failing wheat to dairying.

“I preach the gospel according to the cow,” insisted Hoard, who started a county weekly newspaper in 1870 filled with editorials and articles promoting dairying and 15 years later launched Hoard’s Dairyman, the nation’s first specialized agricultural magazine.

He pointed out that the shallow glaciated soils of Wisconsin were not suitable for the state’s wheat production, but that the land was ideal on which to raise dairy herds.

Hoard founded the Wisconsin Dairyman’s Assn. in 1872. A year later he secured a reduction in freight rates and leased the first railroad refrigerator car to ship Wisconsin cheese out of state to eastern markets.

In 1889 he financed and made the first cow census in the United States. It was through his efforts that the first dairy school in the nation was established at the University of Wisconsin in 1890. Hoard served as president of the board of regents at the University of Wisconsin where a statue to his memory stands at the entrance to the College of Agriculture.

During Hoard’s term as Wisconsin governor in the 1890s he created the Wisconsin Dairy and Food Commission, the first state agency in America designed to ensure food purity.

In 1895 he began promoting tuberculosis eradication in cows, a move that brought down the wrath of many farmers for it meant losing money slaughtering their diseased herds. It was a campaign that lasted 45 years with Hoard’s Dairyman leading the fight. Through the years the magazine has led several campaigns to rid cows of crippling diseases.

And, in 1899 Hoard established the Hoard’s Dairyman farm, the birthplace of modern dairying, a mile from his publishing plant in downtown Fort Atkinson where he pioneered many dairy practices now common. The 550-acre farm to this day is the best-known dairy farm in the world because of the attention devoted to it in the magazine.

It was here that Hoard demonstrated that alfalfa, not clover and traditional dairy feed, had far more protein value for cows. Today, thanks to Hoard, alfalfa is the greatest forage-producing plant in America.

The farm is listed on the National Registry of Historic places. It is home for the oldest continuously registered Guernsey herd in North America and is constantly among the top herds in the nation for milk producers.

A Household Name

William Dempster Hoard is a household name to every man, woman and child living on a dairy farm in this country, a name little known to other Americans. While dairy producers by the thousands pour into Fort Atkinson, population 9,800, each year, few others, even in Wisconsin, know about the town or realize its significance to dairy farmers.

Hoard’s Dairyman, with a circulation of 180,000 in the United States and 103 foreign countries, is sent to the homes of 91% of all milk producers in this country. The subscription price is $8 a year.

It is affectionately known to dairy farmers as “the big cow book” with one or several cows on every cover. A cow is always on the cover, sometimes only a speck in the pasture, but at least one cow is always there.

Sprinkled throughout each issue of Hoard’s Dairyman, on the walls of the magazine office, in the Dairy Shrine and at the farm are W. D. Hoard sayings and slogans such as:

“The cow is a foster mother of the human race. The thoughts of men turn to this kindly and beneficent creature as one of the chief sustaining forces of human life.”

“Notice to the help: The rule to be observed at all times toward the cattle, young and old, is that of patience and kindness. Remember this is the home of mothers. Treat each cow as a mother should be treated.”

In the editorial room of Hoard’s Dairyman is posted a sign that proclaims: “The next issue will be our best.”

“The biggest asset this magazine has is its credibility,” said William D. Knox, 65, editor. “Every independent survey ever made reports our magazine having the highest credibility rating of any agricultural publication in the nation.”

Knox is only the third editor in the magazine’s 100-year history. Hoard served as editor from 1885 to his death in 1918, Arthur J. Glover from 1918 to his death in 1949, and Knox from 1949 to date.

Hoard’s Dairyman publishes articles written by university professors, veterinarians, agricultural engineers and other dairying experts. The magazine has five editor-writers including Knox. All five spend at least an hour each day working at the magazine’s dairy farm in an advisory and consulting capacity. The farm has 150 cows including 75 milking animals.

“We’re struggling with our herd in these tough times same as our readers,” said Knox, whose turn-of-the-century roll-top desk is covered with miniature cows. Photos of prize-winning cows adorn the walls of his office.

“It is a very humbling experience for us working at the farm. That’s where we keep our feet on the ground,” he added.

Products of Dairy Farms

Each editor is the product of a dairy farm and is a university graduate majoring in dairy science. The editors, recognized as dairy industry’s authorities, are often called upon to address dairy meetings throughout the country.

Letters and phone calls from dairy farmers asking advice are received at Hoard’s Dairyman every day from across the land and from overseas. “When farmers get stuck, they call or write us. The editors take the calls and provide them with the best available information,” said Eugene Meyer, 61, managing editor of the magazine.

Meyer is in charge of the publication’s popular 54-year-old annual cow judging contest. Each year Hoard’s Dairyman runs four photographs of each of five different dairy breeds, side view, rear view, top view, front view, 20 photographs in all.

More than 100,000 readers from dairies all over the United States and from scores of foreign countries each year send in ballots selecting first, second, third and fourth for each breed. A judge for each breed ranks the cows for Meyer. The person who gets the best score wins $100. There are 11 other prizes with $5 the lowest amount received.

“They don’t do it for the money. They do it for the prestige of it,” said Meyer. There have been more than 4.3 million entries since the cow judging contest started.

There’s something in the magazine for everyone on the farm, recipes and patterns for women, a youth page and articles covering all facets of dairy farming as well as ads for supplies and equipment.

Letters come in from farmers in their 90s, readers of the magazine since they first learned to read.

Experiments and research by scientists from the University of Wisconsin and other schools and institutions in cooperation with the magazine have gone on continuously at Hoard’s Dairyman farm since its establishment 86 years ago.

A Heifer barn on the farm built in 1976 is a model for scores of similar barns now constructed throughout the country. There are experiments in solar and geothermal energy-saving systems.

It was six above zero when Bill Knox led the way on a visit to the farm. He stopped at a row of unheated wooden hutches for newborn calfs.

“We had a 23% mortality on newborn calfs putting them inside the warm barn during severe weather,” Knox explained. “During the nine years we have been placing the calfs outdoors in the hutches within two to three hours of their birth and keeping them there for three months, we have lost only one calf. The calfs are in the tiny outdoor houses 24 hours a day in 20 and 30 degree below zero temperatures.”

When Knox came to work for Hoard’s Dairyman in 1941 there were 2.4 million dairy farms in America. Today there are only 178,500. “There were 25 million cows in the United States that year. Now there are 10.5 million. The average herd was 19 cows. Today’s average herd is 73 cows,” he noted.

“The dramatic change has been in upgrading the herds and getting four to six times the milk production per cow per day today than what it was at that time.”

The farm’s herdsman is Greg Galbraith, 27, a University of Illinois graduate. His wife, Wendy, 23, a University of Wisconsin graduate, is his assistant herdsman. “Just to be around these animals, like Annabel here, who produces 52 quarts of milk a day, one of the highest producing cows in the nation, is a dream come true,” said Galbraith.

Four years ago the Dairy Shrine, a new $300,000 library, museum and hall of fame to the cow and the dairyman was erected at Fort Atkinson.

Here tribute is paid to the cow. Photographs of every national grand championship of each dairy breed from 1906 when the selections began are on display.

Every year a guest of honor, the nation’s outstanding dairy leader, is selected by the Dairy Shrine board of directors. This year’s honoree is Wesley Sawyer of the Diamond S. Ranch at Waterford, Calif. Sawyer served eight years as director of the Holstein Assn. of America.

The Dairy Shrine Museum has an outstanding collection of antique butter churns, milk jugs, milk bottles, milking stools, cheese kettles, curd knives and other dairy memorabilia. There are 11,309 members of the Dairy Shrine who paid $35 for a life membership. There are no dues.

There are more cows than people in Jefferson County, location of Fort Atkinson. It is only fitting.