Today, consumers are increasingly concerned with where their food comes from and how it is made. Namely, that it is prepared with thought to sustainable agriculture. W.D. Hoard and, consequently, W.D. Hoard and Sons Co., has embodied this approach from the beginning.

In 1885, W.D. Hoard launched Hoard’s Dairyman magazine in wake of his dairy farming column by the same name. Hoard was interested in what made dairying successful and sustainable as a practice. He’d seen the effects of harsh agriculture on the soil that was used to grow crops in his home state of New York, and he believed there to be a better way to steward the land and serve the animals Americans so lovingly depended on.

According to W.D. Hoard: A Man for His Time (1985), a Madison newspaper referred to Hoard as “the most distinctly American character since Abraham Lincoln.” A singing school teacher, a water pump salesman, a Civil War Veteran, and a politician, Hoard dabbled in several careers before finding editing and agriculture. Still, his fascination with writing and farming began early, serving as the foundation for the Hoard we celebrate today.

Hoard was a mischievous and self-actualizing boy. His mother, herself a lover of language, encouraged him to channel his energy and curiosity into reading extensively and keeping observational journals. As an adolescent, he held an apprenticeship on a farm near his home where he studied “butter and cheesemaking and dairy farming.” It was both during this apprenticeship and through conversations with Chief Thomas Cornelius on the Oneida reservation where his father preached that Hoard learned about conservation and sustainable agriculture.

Later, after moving to the Midwest and dabbling in music and sales while caring for his sick wife and their children, Hoard started a small newspaper called the Jefferson County Union, driven by that early love for print. He included in the Union a dairy column that spoke to his “crusade for pure food, especially dairy products.” He advocated for the regular testing of herds and the growing of alfalfa for feed, among other things. It was his opportunity to “preach the gospel according to the cow” in a state where the dairy industry was growing rapidly.

Then, in 1885, the first solo Hoard’s Dairyman supplemental publication was printed and included in the Union subscription.

“The opening statement of purpose [of Hoard’s Dairyman] went on to project the choiciest and most practical information on management of cows, breeding, butter, and cheesemaking, handling of milk and complete dairy market reports,” wrote Loren Osman in W.D. Hoard: A Man For His Time.

Despite some initial backlash from longtime farmers who didn’t appreciate Hoard’s suggestion that they needed to make changes to their farming practices, the column found success by staying true to the heart and soul of dairying: the celebration of the cow and her milk.

As if being a trailblazing writer and editor wasn’t enough to shape a lasting legacy, Hoard served as governor of Wisconsin from 1888 to 1891. He ran as “the cow candidate,” and had great support from rural communities where people, seeing that he came from similar beginnings as they, knew he would have their interests at heart while in office.

Then, in 1899, in an effort to put what he wrote into practice, W.D. Hoard purchased a farm just outside Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, minutes from the publication office. It is the same farm ¾ and the same office ¾ we own and operate today.

There is scarce a person who has worn as many hats as Hoard did, nor who has had a hand in impacting as many fields of study as he. Wisconsin’s landmark dairying and rich, nutritious soil have Hoard to thank for their excellence. His self-made expertise and far-reaching voice made a true and lasting impact on the agricultural narrative of this state and beyond. A man truly for his time, and for our time, too, Hoard and his dairy pioneering live on in the words we put forth in our publications and in the cheese we make from pure Guernsey milk.

W.D. Hoard: A Man For His Time quotes Hoard near the end of his time as editor: “None of us dreamed in those first years of seeing Wisconsin as such a great and important dairy state. We only felt that we were dealing with a great and growing principle which, when unfolded to its full working, could bring a new order of agriculture into being . . . I bid you be of good cheer. Keep your eyes to the front. Be forward looking.”

The first agricultural publication to have nationwide readership, Hoard’s Dairyman is front and forward to its core. To read or learn more, visit www.hoards.com, and find your own copy of the biography W.D. Hoard: A Man For His Time at https://hoards.com/article-100-wd-hoard-a-man-for-his-time-(wdho).html.

The “Father of American Dairying”: A brief history of W.D. Hoard and his trailblazing approach to dairy farming.

Down on the Farm: Milking and milk storage

Quiz time: How well do you know Guernsey cows?