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‘Lifetime opportunity’
With the March death of dairyman Mac Pate, the Blair family makes sure neighbor’s respected operation continues
| Story and photos by Chris Villines |
5/24/2012 |
Within a span of 12 hours on March 14,
Maryville’s Blair brothers — Scott, Randy, Gary, and Steve — lost both their father, Lemuel, 75, and the neighbor they considered their second father, 86-year-old dairyman Mac Pate, to cancer.
“We lost our two biggest heroes on the same day,” says Scott Blair, who’s worked full time at the Pate dairy for 28 years, starting right out of high school. “That’s life-changing, you know? They both taught us so much and steered us in the right direction.”
The valued friendship of the Blair and Pate families, all longtime members of Foothills Farmers Cooperative, spans more than half a century. Their farms adjoin one another, and when Mac began his storied 63-year dairy operation in 1949, the younger Lemuel was there to help him while operating the Blairs’ beef farm, too.
“Dad used to talk about how he and Mac chopped silage with an M Farmall and an old one-ton truck,” says Gary, who came full time to the dairy three years ago after working for 25 years at the MasterCraft Boats plant in Vonore. “Then Dad got drafted to the Army. They did everything in the world to try and get Dad out of that so he could stay around here and help Mac at the dairy, but they couldn’t do it. When he got out of the Army, he went to work for Alcoa [aluminum plant] and would help Mac on the weekends. They were always there for each other.”
Gary says that as Mac began experiencing health issues, he started laying the groundwork for the future of his dairy. And he wanted the Blairs to be a central part of those plans.
“He first mentioned something to me about us taking over the dairy around five years ago, but I didn’t think he was serious,” explains Gary. “Then he mentioned it again about two years ago. Finally, in November, I stopped by to see him before I did the night milking because he wasn’t getting out much, and he said, ‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I’m ready for you four boys to take this place over.’ I asked him when he wanted to do it, and he said he would like to have everything in place by Jan. 1 and that he would make the transition so easy that I couldn’t say no. Well, I wasn’t going to say no anyway. This was a lifetime opportunity.”
Soon after, Mac also discussed the proposition with Scott.
“Mac knew what my answer would be,” Scott says. “He didn’t even have to ask. I had spent too much time here [at the Pate dairy] not to see it go on. The bottom line is that he wanted to see it continue, Barbara [Mac’s widow] wanted to see it continue, and me and my brothers wanted to see it continue in his name.”
Now, Steve and Randy, who worked 33 and 27 years, respectively, for MasterCraft, have joined their brothers to lease the Pate operation and keep the successful Grade A dairy going strong while also managing their own 80-head Fleckvieh Simmental beef cattle operation, Blair Farms. Steve’s daughters, Jessica, 20, and Bethany, 14, are also involved in the day-to-day work when not in school as are two other full-time employees and three part-timers. Combined, their farms stretch over 1,800 owned and leased acres.
“The Blairs are focused and have a vision out ahead of them,” says Foothills Farmers Cooperative General Manager Brent Best. “It’s not something that they’ve just jumped in to. The key to their success is that they plan and depend on each other for the entire operation.”
Barbara Pate, who worked more behind the scenes balancing the dairy’s books and paying the bills for the duration of her husband’s career, says she is comforted knowing that the farm is in good hands. She has even turned the bookkeeping over to the Blairs.
“They are just doing a wonderful job,” says Barbara. “Mac and I lost our only son, Mac Jr., in 1992, so the Blairs have always been like family to us. Anything they do, you know that it’s going to be done correctly. You don’t have to watch over them. They have one goal, and that’s to do things just the way Mac did them.”
Steve says the philosophy of doing the job right and seeing things through to their completion shared by Mac and the Blairs helped give the veteran dairyman peace of mind about his lifeblood’s future.
“Not to toot our own horn, but I think Mac knew that if anybody could take the dairy over and keep it running like he would, it would be us,” Steve says. “He saw us come up through the years, and he knew how we operated. He knew we would make the commitment to do our very best. He respected us, and we respected him.”
They currently milk 186 Holsteins twice a day, mostly the black-and-white variety but also a few red-and-white cows (Mac was one of the first dairymen in the nation to introduce red genetics to his herd). And just as Mac had done, the milk is sold through Dairy Farmers of America, a farmer-owned cooperative.
Until late last year, the dairy cows were milked three times a day, but the move to two was made with Mac’s blessing.
“We went to two milkings on Dec. 10,” says Gary. “When you figured the labor, utilities, and supplies and penciled in all of the expenses, the economics just didn’t make milking three times a day worthwhile. We didn’t drop any milk quantity by making the change, and the cows are more relaxed. Instead of spending three more hours a day on concrete waiting to get milked, they’re laying in the field or in the barn chewing their cud and making milk.”
This combination of cow comfort and a tailored nutritional program resulted in a milk production average of 80 pounds per head on a recent test.
“We’re comfortable with that,” Scott says. “What we get comes out of the feed and how the cows convert the feed to milk — nothing else. We couldn’t do this without help from the Co-op. There’s no way you can run a successful dairy farm without them.”
The cows are fed a total mixed ration four times daily, a blend that includes a custom mineral pack from Foothills, along with corn silage and other commodities. The dairy calves thrive on Co-op Calf Primer and Co-op 26-20 All Milk Calf Milk Replacer.
“This is one of the top dairy herds in the South,” says Foothills Farmers Co-op livestock specialist Randy Croft. “The torch has been passed from Mac to the Blairs, and they’re doing an excellent job. Mac was never afraid to try something new — he was one of the first in the country to artificially inseminate [AI] his herd — to improve his herd genetics, and I’m confident the Blairs will continue that trend. Dairies today have to be innovative and forward-thinking in order to survive.”
The brothers concede that while they’ve had a “full plate” since the beginning of the year, their all-hands-on-deck approach has allowed each of them to be involved in all facets of the dairy operation, from calving to milking, feeding, breeding, and growing corn and soybean crops for use in the cows’ ration.
“Our working together has been a tremendous help to me,” says Scott, who has taken Mac’s seat on Foothills Co-op’s board of directors. “We all pitch in where we can. After we’re done with the morning milking, the others come down and help me in the fields, and I’ll come up and help them with breeding or do whatever else. We just all want to know what is going on with every part of the business, so we’re continually communicating with each other.”
At the halfway point of their first year at Pate Acres Dairy, the Blairs say that surviving — and thriving — with both the dairy and beef cattle operations are challenges they can meet. They certainly have a believer in their lifelong neighbor and “unofficial relative.”
“It gives me peace and comfort knowing that all of Mac’s hard work will still be carried on,” says Barbara. “It would have been very sad if everything had stopped with his passing. I know that Mac is smiling down on what the Blairs are doing.”
To learn more about Co-op’s complete line of dairy feed and nutritional products, visit with the professionals at your local Co-op or go to the online catalog at www.ourcoop.com.
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