COVER STORY • THE SCHWERTNER LEGACY

The Schwertner Legacy

AGRICULTURE

IF YOU ATE TODAY, THANK A FARMER. IF YOU ATE BEEF, THANK JIM SCHWERTNER.

Ann Marie Kennon

Trading more than 25 million head of cattle since 1946 is the kind of success any cattleman would envy. Indeed, the kind of success the Schwertner family has had is something to aspire to in any industry.

What many people don’t know is how closely that success is tied to aviation, and how Eugene and Jim Schwertner’s addictions to jet fuel helped build Capitol Land & Livestock Co., the largest cattle brokering business in the United States, trading 300-400,000 cattle per year.

THE FOUNTAINHEAD

Eugene Schwertner was born and raised in Schwertner and his father sent him to Texas A&M to be an engineer. Jim says, “He thought his dad meant ‘on trains’, but he did study civil engineering. In his senior year, Pearl Harbor was attacked and he was invited to join the SeeBees. As a front-line fighter, he was convinced A&M kept him alive. The war department was recruiting farm boys with no training in leadership or logistics, but he had trained for that in the Corps of Cadets; he knew what to do to survive.”

When Eugene came home from the war, he just wanted to stay home and, fortunately, his father had begun organizing and trading livestock at public auctions to get away from the corruption he saw in the cattle business. By the mid-1950s, Eugene’s reputation for honesty resulted in many small towns replicating his methods and inviting him to manage their auctions. At this point, however, son Jim was still more fascinated with aviation; “I was just overly accustomed to cattle and I preferred the sounds, smells, and everything else of the jets and airplanes to those of cows.”

FAMILY BUSINESS

Eugene began purchasing land and auctions from Terrell to Belton to Lockhart and east to Caldwell. “My dad was a bigger gambler than me,” Jim says. “My mom, Gloria, was his bookkeeper, and with a mattress in the back of the car, we were like a band of gypsies visiting eight auctions per week. Aside from that, his message was that I would always need a way to keep track of my money. With my mom as his accountant, and checkbooks in cardboard boxes, in every audit, they were right, down to the penny.”

Under his father’s guidance, Jim understood the critical need to know where the business and the finances stood every day, every minute. He said, “I didn’t realize that wasn’t normal. I did realize that our business is very volatile and if you do not watch your margins, you won’t make it.”

Jim Schwertner was trained to run a profit-and-loss business every day of his life.

“Aviation has always been a big part of the business. It was dad’s secret weapon because he could get to the cattle before anyone else. I was trained at age 14 by none other than Emma Browning and, when I was young, my heart was truly in the cockpit of a Navy plane, but I stayed in cattle to help my family survive. That’s not the case today—I love this business.”

~Jim Schwertner, President and CEO of Capitol Land & Livestock

TOO MUCH SUCCESS

In the 1960s, Eugene bought cattle and charged a flat fee for profit. His strategy worked so well that he had to build a distribution center and his enterprise grew to the point that USDA Stockyards and Packers began assessing his practices for anti-trust violations. Jim explains, “Dad had just built a better mousetrap. Ironic that his honesty led to too much success and he was controlling too many cattle. Still, to assuage his competitors’ complaints, dad chose to sell some of his auctions.”

Eugene was not a man to be outmaneuvered. His attorney advised him to put his auctions in young Jim’s name and have him declared an adult legally. “Dad had been training me and I was ready to do more at 14 than most people at 34,” Jim says. “We did not play in my family—we were serious about work. We didn’t have what most would call fun but I had a great life. We did take two weeks off at Christmas and we played hard, but Dad always set the example and ensured we were always taken care of.”

CHALLENGING DAYS

Unfortunately, the beef market crashed two months after Jim graduated college. Beef was boycotted across the country and 80 percent of the Schwertner’s customers went broke. Eugene and Gloria’s tenacity kept the ranch afloat and Jim began studying how to measure supply and demand. He came up with a formula that the company would only follow 24 hours at a time, and guaranteed a “win” 70 percent of the time. Even today, Jim stays at the office until the trading is done, even if it takes until midnight. He recalls, “I was afraid, at first, because dad was literally betting the farm on me, but it worked. The only time I didn’t do it was September 11, 2001. I and everyone else sold everything that morning and the Stock Exchange closed right after. The market dropped 20 percent, but the next day it went back up and, while we didn’t lose any money, it was $200,000 in missed earnings. I’ve never done it since. Even during the pandemic, I stayed with the formula and, as it turned out, families ate more beef per capita and buying went up. I was reminded again how blessed I was by the parents I had.”

RANCHING DONE RIGHT

THE PLANET

Temple Grandin, scientist and animal behaviorist, is a friend to Jim Schwertner. Both are advocates for well-maintained ranch land, which provides ample water and promotes healthy grassland ecosystems for wildlife and endangered species. Both also promote humane treatment of livestock for slaughter.

THE SCIENCE

Aside from this propitious approach to beef, the health of the live animals is also paramount to profit. In 1989, Eugene told the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association that ranchers and farmers were losing $100 per head because their cattle were not weaned properly. Jim explains, “Taking a calf from its mother is very stressful. When a stockyard is resonating with moos, you’re hearing stress. Dad figured it out a long time ago. He always put his personal cattle in a quiet place and taught them to eat. When it’s not done properly, the death rate is as high as 10 percent; ours dropped to 4 percent.”

Eugene was skeptical when Jim told him they could make money on their protocol but he gave him 5,000 acres to try it. Jim went to prominent customers to wean their cattle and promised to guarantee any death loss. Jim’s year-round cow hotel idea became the “Schwertner Select” brand. Owners paid $1 per day per head for 45 days, and when Jim doubled his profit margin for the second time, Eugene sold their combines and got out of the corn business to make more room for the program. Jim says, “We started that in 1989 and we have never had empty pastures. We have different cows every 45 days and the 150,000 cattle we take to market annually from this program are quiet as church mice. There is no amount of vaccines or medicine that will help an animal under stress, so we hydrate and feed them well and they grow up healthy. ”

Beyond the program profit, Texas A&M and the McDonald’s corporation did a study that proved the weaning program was a scientific success, and Jim’s only limit is the amount of land available. “This is a separate division from our trading, and I am always working to find nearby land because it needs consistent management.”

AGRICULTURE

UNTO THE THIRD GENERATION

Like Jim, his son Jimmy was not always on board to be in the business that had worked him so hard growing up. While young Jim had military aviation in mind, Jimmy gave ranching a wide berth and went to Hollywood. He got a degree in movies and theater, had a great career, and was fortunate to work for companies like the Disney corporation, HBO, and many others. He also managed to bring several movie* and commercial projects back to Texas, which provided revenue for the ranch, and a relationship with Temple Grandin, who helped redesign the facility at Capitol Land & Livestock.

Like his dad, Jimmy also has his pilot’s license and loves aviation. Last year, Jimmy came home for Christmas and told the family he was coming home to work for the ranch. Jim says, “I cried like a baby to know that the family business will continue into another generation. I also thought it was pretty great that Jimmy’s decision was largely influenced by Tommy Lee Jones.”

Jim says most people were scared of Tommy Lee, but Jimmy’s work ethic had impressed him. On a project in west Texas, Tommy Lee explained that he knew about the Schwertner family and couldn‘t understand why Jimmy was working so hard for these [movie industry] jerks when he could be back in Texas working for his family. Jim says, “He told him he was an idiot and Jimmy said he thought he was doing a good job. Tommy Lee said he was, but in entertainment, he might make a lot of money for six months and be out of work for a year. He said, ‘Son, I know your work ethic and you’re in the wrong place.’”

As a result, Capitol Land & Livestock Co. will easily continue managing and supplying beef for another 75 years. Jim believes, as he always has, that as long as there are people in McDonald’s and Ruth’s Chris, there is a future in the business. He adds, “Our only real obstacle is the housing coming this way, so I am looking for more land for my kids to continue farming. I have a great team and managers and I’ve taught them the system. They all work hard and have good ethics. I pay them well and they know it’s a good job. It’s what my dad taught me, I am teaching my son, and the Schwertner family will continue to safely and consistently feed families in America.”

*Parts of “Temple Grandin”, the 2010 Emmy award-winning movie were filmed at Schwertner Ranch.

“AVIATION HAS

ALWAYS BEEN PART OF MY WORLD”

Jim Schwertner fell in love with aviation during his first plane ride at age six. He began pilot training at age 14, and was trained by none other than Emma Browning, a contemporary of and friend to Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart. Emma gave aerobatic training to WWI and WWII pilots and trained up Mr. Schwertner to take his first solo flight at age 16.

“I got my license at 17 years old,” Schwertner says. “I quickly trained for multi-engine flight and had most ratings by the time I was 19. Aside from my love of flying, it is good for business. Everyone always wanted to know how my dad got to the cattle so quickly; using aviation to get to the auction before everyone else was his secret weapon.”

As an aviator, Jim’s jobs varied; delivering new planes to their owners, transporting Vietnam war casualties to their homes, crop-dusting, and flying clients to Cowboys games. In 1976, when business began picking up after a cattle market crash, Jim says, “Dad told me to go find a used twin-engine that I felt safe in and I could spend $30,000. He did it to keep me happy but also because he wanted his secret weapon back. It was good for business, but I loved flying my dad and my family all over the world in that plane.”

Today, Schwertner also uses a helicopter to survey his land, check on fences and water supply, and make sure his livestock are healthy.

But it’s not all work. In 2020, Jim escorted Texas A&M’s mascot, Reveille, to Alabama for a game. As several planes carrying football fans began to line up and air traffic got congested, the tower radioed the pilots to adjust their speed and flight paths to avoid proximity risks. When Jim responded that he had to get his special passenger to the game before kickoff, all the other Texas-based pilots jumped in to say, “We’ll throttle back; let that plane go ahead!”

photos this page courtesy of Jim Schwertner