From Jethro to Captain

It all started with Jethro, the champion bucket calf, and last week it ended with Captain, the champion market beef. A span of sixteen years that covered many heartbreaks, experiences, opportunities, countless friends and even a few successes. The 4-H livestock experience was bookended by two calves that could not have been more different and were a good analogy of the whole experience.

Jethro and Captain were both black steers, and that was all they had in common. Jethro was a bucket calf we bought from a friend. Go figure, the first year I needed a bucket calf we had none, so I had to buy a bucket calf. Little did I know that Jethro would be about the cheapest purchase I would make over the next sixteen years.

Isaac named him Jethro after attending the Peace Treaty Pageant at Medicine Lodge. Jethro was the cattle rustler the cowboys hung from a tree and it is beyond me why Isaac was so enamored with that scene that he had to name his calf Jethro. Jethro was a pretty good bucket calf and Isaac gave him a whole lot of attention. Of course, at the tender age of four, Isaac needed our help with him every step of the way.  Everywhere we went that summer we quizzed Isaac about the parts of the bucket calf and other questions the judge might ask.

When the time came, we helped Isaac wash the calf and shine him up. Isaac marched him into the ring and gave the best performance of his career. Jethro was chosen Champion Open Class Bucket Calf that year and we worried it was a mark that we would never hit that mark again. Tatum and Isaac went on to both win the 4-H bucket calf award but after that our family hit a long drought when it came to beef awards.

We bumped along and showed the best calves we had in our herd for several years after that. There were a few successes along the way, a class winner or two but for the most part we spent our time in the middle to lower half of the class. It was frustrating but now looking back the lessons learned with those calves were probably the most valuable ones we could have had.

Fast forward to this year and Captain. Captain came to us from Kentucky and was a show calf through and through. I wish I had a good story as to why Tatum named him Captain, but I don’t. She pronounced him Captain the day he stepped off the trailer and, to be honest, the name fit him to a t. He was a stately steer who commanded your attention. He was also a big teddy bear that never offered any trouble or caused any grief. All in all, he was the easiest steer we ever had when it came to handling and he loved to have his neck scratched.

Tatum put an incredible amount of work into Captain. Each morning she rinsed him off, brushed his hair and fed him all before heading off to work. Captain spent the day with his sidekick in his pen in the barn under fans where it was cool. Then at night she repeated the routine before leading him back to his pen for the night. The work was all Tatum’s with Jennifer and I doing very little. In fact, if we did anything it was under Tatum’s strict supervision. She also spent countless hours working on showing him and by the time the fair came around he was nearly automatic in the showring.

Jethro made one appearance in the showring, at the county fair. Captain made the spring show circuit and the county fair was his eighth trip into the showring. Along the lines of “I couldn’t make this up if I wanted to” was that he moved up one place at each show. Starting out third out of five in class at his first show in Marysville to Reserve Overall Market Beef at the last show before the county fair in Seneca. We joked about how that was a good sign for the county fair hoping that the form held true.

We knew the competition would be tough at the county fair and it was. Captain peaked at the right time and he came into the fair weighing the right amount and looking like we had hoped he would. That night in the showring he looked the best he ever had and showed perfectly. One of the biggest thrills of our families entire 4-H career was when the judge slapped Captain and brought everything full circle.

I won’t lie, two short days later when I walked by Captain on the truck to the processing plant there were tears in my eyes. I like to think I am tough, but Captain tested me.  I scratched him under the neck one last time and thanked him for the experience he had given Tatum, but everything has its time. Words cannot express how blessed we were to have our 4-H career bookended by two champion beef like Jethro and Captain. Its funny how life works out sometimes.