Wayne points out some of the features of the vintage 1952 seed cleaner still used today at Holman Seed Farms.
Oklahoma Country • Winter 2009 • 11
his father-in-law with his carpentry business. “A good friend of mine was working for a seed company and told me they had an opening.” Wayne interviewed with the seed company and was hired on the spot. “It was a good deal for me.” OFF TO MCALESTER After a couple of years, that seed company sold to a Texas company. Wayne left and went to work for another seed company, which was headquartered in McAlester. He advanced quickly, and wound up as vice president in charge of the company’s sales staff. The McAlester-based company served retail firms like K-Mart in the lawn and garden sector. Wayne left the McAlester firm and returned home to Muskogee, venturing on his own to open the Sunburst Seed Company in 1984. When he first opened, the firm served the wholesale seed business but its clientele today is primarily retail. Operating his own seed business, Wayne “made connections” with Bill Holman in Collinsville. Sunburst and Holman Seeds swapped seeds as needed over the years and Wayne and Bill “developed a good friendship.” Holman Seed was one of Oklahoma’s oldest and most respected seed businesses, opened in 1939 by Bill’s father, O.H. The family established
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Clockwise from far left: Wayne, seated, and his wife, Patty, and son, Patrick, are pictured behind the old partner’s desk still used today. Holman Seed Farms is a family-run business today just as it was when it opened originally in 1939. Pallets of seed are stacked high in the Holman Seed Farms warehouse. The
warehouse, a cement block building constructed after Wayne purchased the business in 1994, stands in stark contrast with the other buildings on the site. The original building was constructed in the 1930s and is built entirely from wood. Much of that wood is oak, and appears ready to stand the test of time. Several large containers in the Holman Seed Farms retail show room hold a variety of seeds popular with customers of the Collinsville business.
This old seed bag tag gives a clue about the age of Holman Seed Farms with the phone number it displays – 195. A long row of storage bins is housed on the Holman Seed Farms site in Collinsville. Several of the bins were added after the Herrimans purchased the business in 1994. Seed can be stored in the bins before it is cleaned and bagged and readied for sale.
Oklahoma Country • Winter 2009 • 13
in Collinsville in the 1930s, starting out with a small dairy where Holman Seed Farms stands today. A seed cleaner was purchased, and the Holman family started the seed business. “One day, out of the blue, Bill called me and said ‘I’m thinking about retiring’ and wondered if I’d be interested. “We’d been in Muskogee for 10 years and the place (Sunburst Seeds) was paid for. I went over and he (Bill) gave me some numbers. The bank said it would finance it. . .” WIFE SAYS NO Patty balked. She didn’t like Collinsville and the couple had four children. One son was just a year or so away from graduating from Muskogee High School and wanted to stay to play football and graduate with his longtime classmates.
“But I needed more to do,” says Wayne, and in 1994 the deal with Holman Seed Farms was sealed. “I came up here and worked with Bill. He taught me about seed cleaning, which I’d never done before. I worked with him about 60 days. I thought is was going to be six months.” Wayne drove back and forth from Muskogee to Collinsville daily until 1997 to run the new business. “I made a deal with the kids. We’ll move in the summer. If you don’t like it, we’ll move back in the fall. We stayed. Three of our kids graduated from Collinsville.” “Holman’s had a real good reputation,” says Wayne. “Bill told me as long as you take care of the place, I don’t mind you using the Holman name. That’s why we’ve never changed names since Holman had been around so long and people knew the name. “He (Bill) paid me a compliment four or five years ago. He put his hand on my shoulder and said ‘Son you did it better than I did’.” Wayne admits things have changed since he bought Holmans. “We don’t do as much wholesale as we used to. The business has changed. The quantities aren’t as big. But our business has been okay. We’re not selling what we did five years ago, but the profit it better. “We don’t have any notes (mortgages). That makes it easier to make money. It’s been fantastic.” LOOKS THE SAME The main building of Holman Seed Farms looks essentially the same today as it did in 1939. The wood frame structure contains lots of oak timber, which looks like it can stand the test of future centuries. Wayne has added a new warehouse and a few more storage bins, but even many of the furnishings and business machines in the office were there back in the ’30s. A couple of trucks and an old Allis Chalmers tractor that came with the place still are there. One truck currently needs a bit of front-end work, and the oldest one could use a coat of paint and new bumper – but it still runs and can be used. The large seed cleaner that’s still the centerpiece of business is vintage 1952, a year Wayne remembers easily since he was born then. A plethora of screens stored around the cleaner share similar birthdates, and would cost a fistful of dollars to replace today. The main seed dump, which hoists trucks to dump their loads, is too small for semis. Wayne added a new dock to the warehouse he built to handle the semi-loads of seeds he receives. There’s even a balance beam scale in the office that can be used to weigh out smaller seed orders. An antique corn sheller adorns
14 • Oklahoma Country • Winter 2009
the sales area, and jars full of seeds fill a large, old barber’s shaving cup rack just behind Wayne’s antique two-man partner’s desk. UP-TO-DATE
hours after it’s cut,” he explained. The Herrmians added pecans to the Holman Seed Farms repertoire since buying the business. Wayne said he purchases pecans and sends them to his Sunburst Seeds in Muskogee where he cracks the nuts and gets them ready to sell. “We’d been looking for something to fill the gap since it gets slow in the winter,” he said of the addition of pecans. There also are plans to offer many types of pecan candies and other seasonal goodies to compliment sales of the cracked pecans. Customers at Holman Seed Farms also can purchase farm chemicals and fertilizer. A small selection of bird houses and bird feeders also sits in the small retail showroom, and Wayne also is a dealer for Zipper mowers. Not too bad for a seedy business on the south side of town!
That’s not to say everything’s dated. The Herrimans have a modern computer system and telecommunications system. New floor covering in the office area should be installed soon. “I can’t tell you how many varieties of seed we handle,” says Wayne. “But, we do handle 200 varieties of vegetable seeds alone. There are hundreds of varieties of seeds we carry. We can even special-order native grasses, and we do that. You won’t find a place with the variety of seed we offer.” Much of the seed sold comes from growers not too far away. However, their garden seed suppliers are in Idaho and California and Wayne orders for the next year each July with delivery in December. They then repackage it for their 10 wholesalers ™ at their Muskogee Sunburst Seed Company location. “We do sell a lot of garden seed. We get a lot The Rotating Weed Wiper That Works! of people here for garden seed, and we get a Eliminates Pigweed, Johnsongrass, Thistles, lot of trade from Tulsa for home garden seed,” Ragweed, Love Grass & Any Other Noxious Weeds! says Wayne. Most of the agronomic seed sold goes straight into the retail market today. “The business has reversed itself. Today we’re 90 percent retail and 10 percent wholesale. We’re just about opposite of a few years ago.” Titan fescue seed is the biggest seller year in and year out. Most of it goes straight to the 15 sod farms the business serves. Another 15 or so schools in the area also purchase Titan fescue annually for use on their ball fields. Wayne says the business usually sells the equivalent of Wiped & Dying Pigweed Wiped & Dying Johnsongrass three semi-loads of fescue annually. At one time, soybeans made up a big part of The GrassWorks Weed Wiper™ LLC system is an aggressive yet economical & environmentally the business. However, Wayne says Monsanto friendly method of applying herbicides to control weeds in hay and pasture, row cropping, “absolutely destroyed” the soybean business food plots, sod farms, vegetable truck farms, pecan orchards and many more applications. with the introduction of Roundup-Ready No Drip soybeans.
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ODDBALL STUFF “I’m real cautious about what I sell,” he said. “But, I do have the oddball stuff that everybody else doesn’t have.” One of the “oddball” seeds he sells is Sericea lespedeza. It was used heavily years ago by farmers participating in the government’s old “soil bank program.” Wayne said that “nowadays people that have it cuss it. But we ship 60,000 pounds annually to Japan.” Most of the Sericea lespedeza seed they sell comes from northern Oklahoma and the Japanese farmers plant it on volcanic hills for sheep and goat fodder. “It’s a good legume if it’s managed right. It’s a good hay if it’s baled within a matter of
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Looking back on his life, 90-year-old says
Ada Hutchins, left, has been Elrod’s caregiver for several years. She lives just a couple of blocks away, and the two have become fast friends. Ada drives Elrod to county Farm Bureau board meetings since he only drives his pickup during the daylight hours. “Ada sees I’m taken care of and I do appreciate it. We enjoy each other’s company,” says Elrod.
inety-year-old A.B. Elrod can tell stories for hours, but it’s a faux pas if you ever hear the word can’t roll off his tongue when he’s talking about himself. Elrod – as most everyone calls him – retired from his ranching and farming operation along the Blue River bottoms in Johnston County about 12 years ago and makes his home on a quiet residential street in Tishomingo. It’s apparent upon the first meeting that he’s had his share of scrapes during his 90 years on earth. A shiny hook pokes from the cuff of the left sleeve of his long-sleeve western shirt, and the thumb’s missing from his right hand. “Don’t tell me can’t,” Elrod says as he relates the stories behind the missing left hand and missing right thumb.
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Grenades & Corn Pickers He lost the left hand during World War II after a Japanese soldier tossed a hand grenade his way. He said the wound wasn’t any worse than the one that claimed his right thumb, but gangrene set in forcing the doctor to amputate. “The doctor told me he put $19,000 worth of penicillin in me there,” Elrod remembers of his time in an Army field hospital. But even penicillin – that era’s new miracle drug – could not fight off the infection that cost him his hand. A run-in with a “balled up” corn picker in the ’50s cost him is right thumb – and almost his right hand. Weeds and trash clogged the picker behind his tractor. He got off the tractor, leaving it idling and the PTO still engaged, to unclog the mess only to get his right hand jerked into the machine. He retrieved his thumb with tendons still attached and stuck it in his shirt pocket and headed for his pickup across the field. About half way to the truck, he turned around and went back to shut off the idling tractor – no need to waste fuel. Getting to help was an ordeal. He had two wire gates to go through. Elrod didn’t drive through the gates since he was doing custom work, and it proved to be a tough task opening them with his hook. 16 • Oklahoma Country • Winter 2009
Right: A hook pokes from his left shirt sleeve and he’s missing the thumb on his right hand, but don’t tell A.B. Elrod he can’t do something because of the disabilities. After being a cowboy, a farmer and a rancher for more than 60 years, he has shown everyone that determination conquers life’s obstacles. The Johnston County Farm Bureau member enjoys sharing stories about the beginnings of the organization in the county. The 90-year-old is a charter member, former county president and still serves on the county board of directors today.
When he eventually got to the hospital at Durant, an “old doctor” told him his right hand would have to come off due to the farm accident. But Elrod remembers a “young doctor” who believed he could save what was left. His “young doctor” was successful.
Anything & Everything hose two incidents, and others, gave Elrod his “don’t tell me can’t” attitude. He’s done anything and everything he wanted, and still mows his own yard and cares for his flowers at 90. He’s been in Johnston County since the mid 1940s. Before that, Elrod was a cowboy in the Osage. He and some of his cowboy buddies rode into Hominy and came across a recruiter for the U.S. Army Calvary in the early 1940s. The Calvary promised better pay, so his group joined up.
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“I kick my ass every time I think about it,” Elrod says, looking back “By 12 o’clock I’d bought that place. I didn’t ask my wife or nothing. at his enlistment. It was open range with no roads in or out. He wound up in Texas, where he and some other members of his “When I told my wife, she said ‘I’m not moving.’ I said I’ve done bought Calvary unit regularly rode the border from Brownsville to the Arizona them out. We moved.” line on eight-day assignments. He continued working for the college for a while, but quit to farm After World War II started, the Army disbanded the Calvary. Elrod the place that was his family farm and home for the next 56 years. still vividly remembers taking the unit’s horses to White Sands, N.M., By 1951, Elrod decided his 1936 Ford needed replacing. He went to and “turning them loose. There was some 28,000 head of horses and town and found a brand new Chevy pickup for $1,200. He had about mules turned loose there.” half the money, and had to go to a local bank to borrow the rest. The Elrod married, and his wife, Lena, was allowed to join him in Texas banker told him he’d have to have insurance on the new truck, and sold for 30 days before he was shipped out to fight. him a policy that cost $87 a year. “She got to come to the base for 30 days, just long enough to get in the family way.” After losing his left hand, Elrod was discharged from the Army in 1944 and Heat up to 1000 sq. ft. for pennies a day with an energy saving ega M e returned to the Osage to cowboy again. After v a r S n you $ $ $ o ng Bill about a year, he was convinced to take i ENERGY EFFICIENT: Operates on less than a Mr. Coffee per day. t a e H advantage of the GI Bill and finish his education. He went to Muskogee and eventually PORTABLE – 110 VOLT wound up in Tishomingo at Murray State.
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Tishomingo? “ ’d never heard of Tishomingo. I told my wife about it, and said let’s go down there.” He loaded his wife, two-year-old daughter and two-month-old son into the 1936 Ford he bought for $700 and traveled to Tishomingo. Elrod met the Murray State president, and told him he had a wife and two babies and needed a place to live. “He told me ‘See that dorm. You can have either floor or all of it’. I wound up there.” Despite the Army paying his way in school, Elrod still needed a job to help support his family, which eventually grew to two boys and two girls. Murray State gave him a job on its farm outside of town on the Blue River. He stayed with that job a couple of years. One day after a big rain, he got on a horse and swam the horse across the swollen river to a neighbor’s spread. They began talking about the river bottomland, and “he told me ‘Elrod let me sell you this place’.
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Elrod poses with some of the medals, his sergeant stripes and other memorabilia from his service in the U.S. Army. He enlisted and was a member of the Army Calvary before World War II began. The Calvary was disbanded when the war began, and some 28,000 government horses and mules were turned loose near White Sands, N.M. Elrod spends a lot of time in this recliner in his Tishomingo home. While he relaxes more nowadays, he still does his own mowing and yard work. He can be found perched here almost every weeknight when his favorite television show, Wheel of Fortune, airs.
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A Preacher from Durant ome time afterwards, Elrod met a preacher from Durant, who just also happened to be selling Farm Bureau Insurance. When they talked, the man told him he could sell him insurance on his pickup for half of what the bank was charging. Being the frugal type, he changed to Farm Bureau and stopped by to tell the banker. The banker wasn’t there, so Elrod told his secretary he bought other insurance and didn’t need the policy from the bank. “Next spring I was in town and met the bank president. He asked me about his insurance. I said I got Farm Bureau Insurance. He said ‘Are you gonna pay me for my insurance’? I just got mad and jumped in his face.”
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Elrod, a World War II veteran, proudly flies Old Glory in his front yard daily.
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