“It always seems impossible until it’s done.”—Nelson Mandela We have one of the coolest dairy stories out there. When my husband, Bruce, and I met in 1996, neither one of us had anything except a couple of car payments.

Lampman rebecca
Rebecca Lampman

We didn’t have families with farms or money. We sold his high school truck to pay for the $2,000 wedding and wrote his parents a check for $400 the day before we got married so they could pay for a rehearsal dinner because things were tight for them. Bruce was a small-town boy with a big, tall dream – to own his very own dairy farm.

He attended the herdsman program at Utah State University and moved to Idaho so he could start working on dairy farms and begin to gain experience.

After several years of working on large farms, a wonderful couple with a small Brown Swiss herd gave him a chance to take over management of their dairy. Together, we worked many long days, months and years as employees building up the dairy facilities and improving the herd health and genetics, all while performing all the other duties of a dairy farm.

Nine years later the owners, Jodie and Charles, were wishing to slow down and simplify. Their children weren’t interested in the dairy, and hardly a day went by without Bruce reminding them he was.

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Jodie and Charles have always been pillars of our community, both active in the local church and serving on a number of boards and committees. As business owners in a small town, they also felt a sense of responsibility toward their employees.

They showed us time and again their business was there to make money, but it was also a tool for improving small rural economies, providing a decent and respectable living for growing and hard-working families, and it was also a way and means of giving back.

Finally, the day Bruce has always dreamed of came. A purchase agreement was reached that was fair for them and feasible for us. But before we signed papers, Charles asked that we come for dinner.

“Things are about to change for you,” he said. “As owners of a dairy, you now have added responsibilities that go beyond just the dairy farm itself. You will have employees you are responsible for. You must provide a good living for their families. And as a business owner, [you] have an added civic duty to fulfill to the community.” Charles was passing the torch.

He was right. Owning a business is both a gift and a responsibility. Now that we are employers, we value our employees, their families and all of the commitment and hard work they put into helping us have a successful business. And 2016 wasn’t easy. Negative political rhetoric has taken its toll.

Many hard-working farmers and their families have faced bullying and harassment in the schools, the community and the workplace.

The people in our country who perform the hard work of producing and processing our food don’t deserve this, and I believe it is the civic duty and responsibility of farm business owners across the country to speak out against these injustices and to include as a part of our family farm stories the incredible contribution given day in and day out by all of our hard-working employees.

People want to know where their food comes from; they must also know who it comes from. The truth is: Without our employees, we simply couldn’t exist.

We still visit with Charles and Jodie every week. Charles has had a stroke, and talking is difficult for him, but their kindness and his words were not lost on me and will never be forgotten. For with business ownership and its many blessings also comes moral and civic responsibilities we must always remember to fulfill.

Not too many people would take a chance on a small-town boy with no money, a big dream and lots of determination. Someday, the torch will pass, and I know just what I will say.  end mark

Rebecca Lampman owns and operates Lampman Dairy Farm with her husband, Bruce, their three children and their wonderful employees. Albert the peacock keeps watch over the farm, making sure everyone performs their civic duty. His calls serve as a constant reminder that “all that we have, we owe to udders.”

Rebecca Lampman