Arizona Farming – Ranching Hall of Fame
Honorees for 2008

Steve Bales, Sr. is a long time hay farmer/horse breeder in Buckeye. Bales ranch is known for its fine Quarter Horses. Mr. Bales has also been involved with the breeding and raising of top cattle and has managed several feedlots in the area. Although he is retired from active farming and ranching he is still an avid roper.

The Brown family settled in the Payson area in the late 1800s. Early pioneers, the family has farmed and ranch throughout the area. Eighty-three year old Jim Brown and 76 year old Connie Brown are still active, making themselves available to help out or to give advice to their twin sons and their grandchildren who are carrying on the family agricultural tradition.

Jim Hauser has spent a lifetime in the agricultural industry. He has been active in custom farming, management of a 76,000 acre ranch in Utah, and served on the Farm Bureau in Tolleson for four years and in Apache Country from 1964 to the present. In addition, he served as president and been a board member of the Agricultural Stabilization & Conservation Service, which later became the Farm Service Agency.

The Krentz Ranch was founded in 1907 and is completing its 100th conservative year of operation. Family owned, the ranch specializes in purebred Hereford and Charolais cattle as well as cross-bred cattle. The Krentz Ranch is well known for its extensive water line, which operates mainly by gravity flow. Through the family’s continuous efforts to provide water to new areas they have created a 25,000 acre wildlife habitat in addition to providing water for their livestock.

Chuck Lakin has managed feed lots in Prescott and farmed in Avondale since 1921. In 1960 he pioneered a successful new product -- pelleted complete horse feeds. The president of Lakin Milling Company and Lakin Cattle Company, he has served as president or as a member of the board of a number of agricultural organizations including the American Quarter Horse Association, Equine Research Committee; Arizona Quarter Horse Breeder’s Association; Arizona farm Bureau Federation; Arizona National Livestock Association and the Arizona Agribusiness Council.

Cecil H. Miller, Jr. has served the agricultural community at the local, state and national levels. His career started as the Chapter President of the Phoenix Union High School FFA. In 1962, he was elected to the board of director of the Salt River Project and in 1971 he was elected president of the Arizona Farm Bureau and remained as president until 1991. In 1980 he became vice president of the American Farm Bureau. Mr. Miller continues to represent agriculture on Arizona’s Navigable Streams Adjudication Commission and serves in an advisory capacity to the Dean of the College of Agriculture at the University of Arizona.

Emil M. Rovey was born to a farming family and inherited the love of the land. He joined the Glendale-Peoria Farm Bureau in the 1940s and was a member until his death in 1998. He was a director of the Southwest Producers and Consumers Cooperative and helped organize the Co-op Dairy, which merged into the United Dairymen of Arizona in 1964. He served as the president of the American Dairy Association from 1952 to 1959. When a few hens owned by his wife evolved into a full-fledged poultry business he became the president of the Arizona Poultry Association. Rovey was known for his on going association with international students that began in 1954 when two Danish brothers knocked on his door looking for work. During the next 30 year approximately 200 international students, mostly from Denmark and other Scandinavian, countries, worked on the Rovey Farms. He was named Man of the Year in Arizona Agriculture by the state Future Farmers of America in 1958. Mr. Rovy died in July of 1998.

Ronald R. Wood was born in Chandler six months before Arizona gained statehood. For a short time in the early 1920s he and his family operated a dairy farm in the now ghost town of Swansea. The venture was short-lived because of problems with the water table in the area so the family headed back to Chandler where Mr. Wood continued to help his father and grandfather with the dairy business. Later he became ranch manager of the 12,000 acre Marionette (cotton) Ranch for J.G. Boswell. It was Colonel Boswell who helped him buy the Avondale Ranch. Wood was one of the first farmers to recognize the potential of the short cotton growing season to use the same land to grow wheat. Mr. Wood joined the Agua Fria Union High School Governing Board, a position he held for the next 36 year. Among his honors were Coldwater Kiwanis Citizen of the Year; National FFA Organization Degree of Honorary American Farmer; Arizona Agribusinessman of the Year nomination; Arizona School Boards Association Honor Roll and having both the Agua Fria High School Football Stadium and the new Administration Building named in his honor.

Mr. Wood passed away in December of 2002.