My dad, James Baugh, grew up working on his dad’s farm.  From his earliest memories, he was out in the field with the rest of the family working the soil, managing the weeds and harvesting the yield.  He even remembers taking a nap as a very small boy on a cotton sack that his mom was pulling along while she picked cotton.  

As he became a man, he began to see ways to improve some farming practices, so he took a risk and set out on his own.  He and my mom, Pat, found some land about 65 miles south of where they both grew up and began the process of building a farming operation that could sustain multiple generations.  

They had three sons and then me.  We all spent our early childhood days either traipsing around fields that doubled as our yard or riding on different farm vehicles sitting on my dad’s knee.  At different points throughout his years of farming, Dad has grown and harvested cotton, soybeans, wheat, corn, maize and rice.  

As the boys matured, they were groomed to make detailed observations, long term plans and experimental decisions that may lead to a better way of farming.  

Today, all the boys and most of their children, who are young adults now, live within 30 miles of our original farmland.  While they don’t all participate in the farming business, we still enjoy gathering frequently around the dinner table to talk about how the rice looks and what kind of yield the cotton’s going to bring this year.  One of my brothers, Phil, is now running the day-to-day operations while my dad has moved into the retirement stage.  Phil has enhanced the business in countless ways which include partnering with colleagues to farm the land we own while branching out into other agriculture related businesses.  

I love my people and know you will enjoy getting to know them.  We are a diverse group who have all taken the lessons we learned from our Mom and Dad to influence our individual corners of the world.