Record crowd attends sixth Women in Ag conference Friday

Howard Marshall of Fulton was the luncheon entertainment during the sixth annual Regional Women in Agriculture and Ag Landowners Conference held on Friday, March 13, at the Martin Community Center in Marshall. Marshall told stories and played fiddle tunes during his presentation. He was accompanied by Ron Ray of Harrisburg on guitar and Kathy Gordon of Columbia on bass. (Marcia Gorrell/Democrat-News) [Click to enlarge] [Order this photo]

A record crowd attended the sixth annual Regional Women In Agriculture and Ag Landowners Conference, held Friday, March 13, at the Martin Community Center in Marshall.

"I am so excited and very proud of this turnout. This has been a gradual buildup of very informational, powerful sessions," said Becky Plattner, Saline County presiding commissioner and one of the event organizers.

"I'm just so proud of the people that helped work together to make this happen. I am extremely happy for Saline County that we're able to host this here," added Plattner.

Approximately 150 women and men from two dozen counties attended the daylong conference, which covered a large variety of topics ranging from estate planning to raising meat goats.

"I am delighted at the enthusiasm and the level of learning that happened today," said Cynthia Crawford, Saline County extension specialist and another event organizer. "The keys to success were bringing people together from a large geographical area, having a world-class facility to meet in and the sharing of ideas that happened today."

The keynote speaker for the day was Val Farmer, who has a doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Arizona, is a counselor, writes a weekly newspaper column and has written three books, including "Honey I Shrunk the Farm."

"I stand in awe and admiration of farmers for a lot of other things besides their ability of produce. One of those is the ability to handle a lot of things at the same time," said Farmer, who spoke about the keys to success in agriculture and the 10 steps in a good succession plan.

He ended his talk by discussing the legacy that farm families can leave their children, along with the possibility of leaving them a business.

"The main thing is your children are doing fine in life because they were raised in a family where the true legacy was the human kindness and caring that was communicated. That's the legacy that farmers really need to care about, along with the legacy of, maybe, leaving a business opportunity along with it."

During a lunch served by Jackson's LLC of Marshall, fiddle player and entertainer Howard Marshall of Fulton played tunes and told stories about the history of the music. He was accompanied by Ron Ray of Harrisburg on the guitar and Kathy Gordon of Columbia on the bass.

Organizers are already looking forward to next year's conference, which will be March 12, 2010, at the community center.

"The date is set for next year and we will begin planning for that in the next 30 days," said Crawford.

Each year the event is organized by Saline County's extension office and Saline County's USDA service center.

This year's sponsors were FCS-Financial of Marshall, Mid-Missouri Energy of Malta Bend and W.B. Young of Marshall.

Contact Marcia Gorrell at marshallag@socket.net