Hall of Famers

Arkansas Agriculture Class XXXV loaded with leaders

Leadership and service that brought distinction to the state’s largest business sector is the hallmark for five new inductees into the Arkansas Agriculture Hall of Fame.

These will be inducted March 3 in a ceremony at the Statehouse Convention Center in Little Rock.

Ellis Bell, Forrest City

A fourth-generation minority farmer who spent decades overcoming obstacles, Ellis Bell now operates an Arkansas Century Farm established in 1878. After graduating in 1956 from Lincoln High in Forrest City, Bell worked 13 years as both an aircraft mechanic and as an insurance industry broker in St. Louis before returning to the farm in 1971 when his father retired.

Bell earned a pilot’s license so he could fly back and forth to St. Louis, allowing him to maintain his work there and at the farm. He has also been dually driven to successfully farm and advance agriculture among minority youth. Bell’s determination led him to found

Bert Greenwalt, Jonesboro

A professor of Agri Economics at Arkansas State University since 1991, Bert Greenwalt co-founded and directs the college’s annual Agribusiness Conference and sponsors the Agribusiness Club, including trips to the Chicago Board of Trade and Federal Reserve Bank locations. Greenwalt’s friends say he teaches Agribusiness, Ag Policy and Ag Finance with a passion at A-State. He and his brother, Eric, nephew, Chad and mother, Idena, manage the Greenwalt Company farm in Hazen, striving to conserve natural resources, especially water. From 1999-2013, Greenwalt served six years as a director of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis followed by seven years on the St. Louis Fed Agribusiness Council.

A passion for the subject he was teaching, a desire to make it relevant for his student’s futures and an appreciation of the economics of soil and water conservation are what former pupils say they remember most about Greenwalt.

Greenwalt has been recognized for Excellence

Bell’s Ag Tech and Bell Community Services, which was formerly known as Future Agriculture Resources for Minority Youth.

Today, Bell farms on land purchased by his great-great grandfather after his return from the Civil War. Bell says he always wanted to farm and his earliest ag memories include showing animals as part of New Farmers of America. During his years in St. Louis, he operated a distribution program offering food to thousands of needy and still returned weekends to help on the farm. Bell noticed young people needed activities and developed programs to teach them where food came from, and who was responsible for growing it.

Shenzhen, China. in Mentoring and Advising at A-State and as a Distinguished Alumnus by the University of Arkansas Department of Agricultural Economics. Greenwalt Company earned Farm Family of the Year for Arkansas’ East-Central District in 1984 and garnered an Outstanding No-Till Farm Award in 1985.

Chris Isbell, Humnoke

Innovative Chris Isbell was the first farmer to grow prized Koshihikari rice outside of Japan, and the thrill of doing it spurred him on to develop and grow a premium variety of Yamanda Nishki rice used to make Japanese sake. When covid shut down Japan exports in 2020, Isbell had Japanese sake rice ready and waiting, and he now sells rice to sake breweries around the world. His product and Hot Springs’ sparkling spring water are now being used to create a new Origami Sake in Arkansas. Isbell’s moto of “never says no” to research has led to meaningful partnerships with both the University of Arkansas and Arkansas State University. His sustainability efforts include water-saving methods, solar fields helping power the farm and flooded fields for water-

Steve Stevens, Tillar

fowl in the offseason. Isbell earned USA Rice Farmer of the Year honors in 1996 and the Arkansas Farm Bureau’s Farm Family of the Year award in 2019. He has served on the Bayou Meto Water District Board of Directors since 2020.

Isbell’s family has been raising rice since 1948 and he made agriculture more than a way of life with a broader vision of the farm. His understanding, wisdom, forward-thinking, ability to communicate ideas and see them to fruition, made farming better. His was a place to dream, experiment and learn. He strived to make ag an amazing way of life for himself and those around him, including his children and grandchildren.

Appropriately, Isbell attends Harvest Church, where he serves as an elder, plays guitar in the church band and teaches a small group.

commitment to improving farming have helped Arkansas generate millions of dollars using practices and technology developed on his farm. He served on the National Cotton Council Board and in leadership positions on the Cotton Inc. Board. In 2020, he was inducted into the Arkansas Conservation Hall of Fame.

Steve Stevens has a long history of learning from and working with researchers to make farming better. One of the more significant cotton seedbed-preparation innovations was first implemented in Arkansas on Stevens’ farm in the early 1990s. He was an early adopter of computerizedhole selection for irrigation and COTMAN (Cotton Management program), improving soil, water and insecticide use. Arkansas Discovery Farms selected Stevens’ fields for cotton research in 2013, and it has had more waterquality, water-use and nutrient-loss data collected on it than on any other farm in America. His contributions and has had more water-quality, water-use and nutrient-loss data collected on it than on any other farm in America.

Steve

Stevens learned working with Discovery Farm and installing soil moisture sensors, irrigation waters were not moving below six inches and cotton roots were not going deeper even with water stored at 18 inches. So, he started using cover crops like cereal rye, which opened the “soil profile” allowing cotton continued on page 22 roots to extract water from 18 inches. Yields increased, especially in dry years, resulting in substantial profit gains.

Jesse “J.D.” Vaught, Horatio

A pioneer in contract livestock production, J.D. Vaught adapted early in both chicken and swine production and used technology like performance records and artificial insemination to improve purebred Charolais (early 1970s) and Angus cattle (1980s). He built chicken houses in the early 1960s and a contract hog facility in the mid 1970s, produced poultry from 1964-1999 and was a partner in Poultry House Cleanout Service from 1968-74. Vaught was a member of the Arkansas Farm Bureau state board of directors from 1991-99, a Sevier County Cattlemen’s Association officer and was instrumental in founding regional pork producer associations and the Grannis Trail Riders. He owned and operated a 400-acre family farm from 1963 until his death at age 82 on Dec. 26, 2022. At the time of his death, Vaught had 150 cattle and 520 swine sows. He served on the Horatio School Board for 23 years and was a founding member of the school’s Ag Booster Club.

Vaught also served 25 years on Farm Credit of Western Arkansas’ board for 25 years. Other awards and recognition he earned include: 1975 Sevier County Farm Family of the Year, Perseverance and Quality Awards from Cargill Pork, Pioneer Pork Producer Award from the Arkansas Pork Producers, Pilgrim’s Pride Poultry service award, 2007 Sevier County Farm Bureau’s Agriculture Citizens of the Year and Sevier County Rural Water Association’s service award.

He and his late wife of 50-plus years, Linda, loved the life of agriculture and raised four children. •

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