SDPB Supporter Spotlight - September
Jill O’Brien, Wild Idea Buffalo Company, Hermosa
Dan O’Brien, author, wildlife biologist and rancher, started Wild Idea Buffalo Company in 1997. Wife Jill O’Brien grew up on a dairy farm south of Milbank and worked in kitchens and restaurants before joining Dan at Wild Idea. Jill works on the Cheyenne River Ranch near Hermosa as co-CEO and marketing director. About 900 bison graze the ranch’s grasslands and Wild Idea Buffalo Company works with local sourcing partners who share the large landscape-grazing model. The model includes field harvests and minimal handling, with no administration of antibiotics or hormones.
Jill says their sustainable practices are helping them through this season’s extreme weather. “Of course we’re concerned. There’s the fire hazard, and there’s plenty of fuel on that prairie. We’ve been getting just enough rain to get through. We manage our land for drought and practice grazing rotation, so we’re in pretty good shape.”
Wild Idea works to revitalize the prairies and improve the food supply by bringing back the buffalo. “We monitor the number of animals the land can support and simultaneously regenerate the prairies, keep the soil and grass healthy as the animals graze as nature intended them to do. It’s important to break even, but breaking even is a good year for us. Our bottom line and markers for success are a healthy environment, healthy prairie and pasture, more birds and a greater array of species on the land.”
They support SDPB as underwriters because they believe their customer base and the public broadcasting audience share similar values. “They generally care about environmental concerns and that’s the root of Wild Idea Buffalo Company. They care about climate change, land degradation, animal welfare. They’re connected to political happenings, both locally and nationally, that impact ranching. For us it’s a venue for our product to come full circle, from soil to grass to animal, to meet in a package that we can share and we can consume with a clear conscience.”
“Our customer base and SDPB’s audience is passionate about these issues. We know where our food comes from, how it’s been raised, that it’s been humanely harvested. That’s a full-circle food supply right there and that’s what we’re trying to accomplish.”
Gwen McCausland, Director South Dakota Agricultural Heritage Museum, Brookings
Gwen McCausland has served as the director of the South Dakota Agricultural Heritage Museum for seven years. Raised on a North Dakota farm as the daughter of a large and small animal veterinarian, McCausland was involved in 4-H and FFA before graduating with degrees in anthropology and ethnography from NDSU and Cardiff University in Wales.
With over 20 years experience working in museums, McCausland found an attractive opportunity with the Ag Heritage Museum. “I found this position appealing because I come from a long history of farmers.” says McCausland. “I’ve always been passionate about local food movements and sustainable agricultural practices. This great museum, with it’s great collection, which has great support from SDSU, provides a framework for us to try new ways to view and interpret agriculture.”
“People assume the museum is just about homesteading or the caricature of a farmer with a straw hat, bib overalls and wheat in his mouth on a two-cylinder tractor. But what’s fascinating about our museum is that, unlike historic sites interpreting a farm in a specific time period, our scope is from the moment humans first domesticated plants and animals up through today. People have been cultivating corn, beans, squash and sunflowers along the Missouri River for thousands of years. The Mandans and the Sahnish have a long, rich cultivating history. Precision ag and soil conservation are not new, and our ag history doesn’t end in 1950.”
McCausland relishes the opportunity to fulfill the museum’s role as the official repository for agricultural history for the state of South Dakota by imparting the full spectrum of the region’s ag heritage, but also by providing a platform for today’s cutting-edge technology and science research nurtured at a land grant university with an agriculturally rich curriculum and extension service. “We want to share not only the history of agriculture in South Dakota, but the science and cultural components that infuse that history in rural communities in the Upper Plains.”
When locusts swarmed or the Homestead Act was passed, McCausland is excited to provide context. “It didn’t happen in a vacuum. There were scientific, social, economic, and legislative components that contributed to those moments. Our hybrid exhibits and programs, like Electrifying Rural South Dakota, showcase the in-depth contexts of food and fiber production and how it impacts our lives to this day.”
“Our museum and public broadcasting share a very common audience. Both of them are interested in lifelong learning, history, culture, and science. We’re both storytellers, just in different formats. SDPB helps us find more space to tell our stories. Tractors have gotten bigger, but the museum has not. Our collections are growing and our stories are statewide. We try to bring the museum’s resources to everyone. Our partnership with SDPB makes sense.”
Sound Vision: SDPB’s Sound Vision Campaign- Building Community One Story at a Time
SDPB’s Sound Vision Campaign is a multi-year effort that has helped build studios, expand local journalism, enhance programming, and create outreach events South Dakotans trust and enjoy.
For more information or to make a gift supporting the Sound Vision Campaign, visit: SDPB.org/SoundVision. To make a multi-year pledge, please contact the Friends Development team by phone at 800-333-0789 or by email at [email protected]