Q+ A
with Newly-Elected WFBF President Joe Bragger
Who asked you to join Farm Bureau and when? I was asked to join Farm Bureau by Buffalo County’s Don Dittrich. It happened outside of St. Boniface Catholic church after Saturday evening mass. I like this question because when I hear someone ask this, it seems the person knows exactly who asked them to join Farm Bureau and where. To me, this signifies a life changing moment. I was asked to be a Buffalo County Farm Bureau board director at the same time. This was my first exposure to Farm Bureau in an active way. I was in my early 30s when I joined but I’ve always wished I would have been asked to join sooner.
Tell us a little bit about your family. Noel, my partner in crime for 28 years, and I have four children. Rosli is a registered nurse, John is a diesel mechanic and owns Mad Swiss Trucking, Tessa is student teaching as she goes for her degree in math education and Allison is studying ag business management while interning at
Compeer Financial. Our children have always been encouraged to explore their options and the possibilities available to them in life. While our daughters and John have their own careers, they help whenever possible on our family’s dairy farm. We are proud of their successes and appreciate that they assist where they can. Noel grew up on a dairy farm just a few miles ‘over the hill.’ Noel is a teacher at St. Boniface Catholic School. In addition to teaching full-time and helping on the dairy when she can, she owns and operates a pullet (chicken breeding stock) barn. She raises about 62,000 hens and roosters per year. My brother Dan and sister-in-law Mary operate two broiler barns, where they raise almost 1 million birds a year. Dan is the overall operations manager on our farm. Their children Gavin, Morgan and Anna are young adults who also assist when needed. Dan’s brother-in-law Peter Theisen, Al 'the Good' Shepard and our team of diverse employees make sure the daily tasks on the farm get done. My other brother Eric is a truck driver and my mother, Hildegard, still lives in the main farmhouse along with some of her grandchildren. At 84 years young, she still rakes hay in summer, picks up parts and shouts commands from the command center (her front porch). As with many farm families, it’s hard to draw a line of who is family and who is not. The support system I have at the farm allows me to take opportunities like serving as WFBF President and for that I’m sincerely grateful.
