Minnie Lou Bradley talks 70 years of ranching progress in OSU Extension webinar

Minnie Lou Bradley talks 70 years of ranching progress in OSU Extension webinar

Monday, November 18, 2024

Media Contact: Gail Ellis | Editorial Communications Coordinator | 405-744-9152 | [email protected]

The Oklahoma State University Beef Extension team featured OSU distinguished alumna Minnie Lou Bradley in a Rancher's Thursday Lunchtime Series webinar in October.

Bradley was the first woman to graduate with a bachelor's degree from OSU's Department of Animal Husbandry (later named Animal and Food Sciences) in 1953. She was also the first woman to compete on the OSU livestock judging team, earning high individual in the beef cattle division at the 1952 American Royal Livestock Judging Competition. Later that season, she placed first in sheep, second in horse and first overall at the Chicago International Competition, carving a path for other women to participate in local and national livestock judging contests.

Bradley and her husband, Bill, established Bradley 3 Ranch in Memphis, Texas, 25 miles northwest of Childress and the gate to the panhandle of northwest Texas. In the early 1950s, they pioneered cattle management techniques in the area's dry and rough terrain. The Bradleys' daughter and son-in-law, Mary Lou and James Henderson, joined the business, and seven decades later, the family owns one of the most respected seed stock Angus operations in the country. Their management practices have revolutionized the industry by minimizing herd deficiencies and creating profitable bulls for commercial producers.

The OSU Beef Extension team met with 92-year-old Bradley in Texas to reflect on her ranching success and discuss the family's impact on the beef industry.

She was named a Graduate of Distinction in the OSU Department of Animal and Food Sciences in 1988, received the Master Breeder Award in 2010 and was recognized as a Ferguson College of Agriculture Distinguished Alumnus in 2015. OSU also selected Bradley as a Distinguished Alumna in 2023. She was listed in "Beef Magazine" in 2004 and 2014 as a Top 40 Cattleman, inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame in 2006, and joined the Saddle and Sirloin Portrait Gallery in Lexington, Kentucky, in 2014.

Blue ribbons and making her way in a man's world

Bradley was raised in central Oklahoma on a small farm. At age 5, she temporarily moved in with her grandparents while her sister recovered from a medical operation. Her uncle, a senior in high school, was her ride to school each day.

"Every evening, he would pick me up from school. He and his friends loaded up in cars and pickups and would go out to one of the farms to see their FFA projects," she said. "I went with them. I'd see pigs, cattle and wheat. The boys would just take care of me and have taken care of me ever since."

At age 9, Bradley convinced her grandfather to give her a few lambs she could feed for a show in Oklahoma City. Her lambs, hauled in an old trailer pulled behind a Pontiac sedan, dominated the show of adult exhibitors. Bradley took home the blue ribbon, winning the hearts of local FFA instructors who helped her with projects in the many years of competitive livestock exhibitions that followed.

When Bradley enrolled at Oklahoma A&M College (now OSU), she was a first-generation college student and eager to pursue her interest in livestock judging.

"I wanted to judge every Saturday if I could," she said. "I just loved going to those field days. I'd beg somebody to take me, and there were always Oklahoma A&M representatives there. It's the only school I ever thought I'd go to. I didn't know anything about college, and I surely didn't know I would be the only girl (majoring in animal husbandry)."

Learning about animal science and livestock confirmation was normal to Bradley, but not to her male professors and classmates. Her presence as a woman in the classroom, laboratory and barn ruffled feathers, but she learned to carry on despite inappropriate comments or language aimed in her direction. Her orientation into a man's world of animal husbandry was not easy, and taking chemistry with veterinary and medical students was overwhelming. She said she almost gave up that first semester if not for professor James Webster, the head of the chemistry department.

"I didn't even know what a test tube was and at mid-term; I might have had a 5 average," she said. "I went to Dr. Webster and said, 'I guess I'd better drop out.'" He said, 'No, you're not going to drop out. We're getting you a tutor, and you're starting all over at mid-term.' I ended up with 13 hours of a B in chemistry. I'll always remember he was the one who said, 'You're going to stay, and you're going to make it.'"

Bradley never missed a judging workout during the grueling travel season of livestock competitions. She also signed up for the meats judging team but excelled most at livestock evaluation. When it came time to select who would compete at the Denver Stock Show in 1952, her scores were the highest on the team, but she wasn't chosen to make the trip. She was heartbroken.

"They'd never had a girl (in the competition), and they didn't think the judges would be fair with me giving reasons," she said. "They left me home, and it really got to me, but I just kept going."

Bradley's consistent judging scores were high enough to compete at national events where women were unwelcome. After members of the Oklahoma A&M administration determined she was eligible to travel with the team, she prepared to compete at the Fort Worth Stock Show. She was the first woman to enter the event, and the show's organizers and competitors' coaches made sure she felt the pressure. She was pulled aside and told her performance would determine if other women would be allowed to participate in the future.

"I was putting the college in a position where its name was on the line," Bradley said. "I felt so bad about it. That wasn't my intention, but I had a pretty good day. That spring, I was the top individual at the Oklahoma A&M Block and Bridle International."

Building Bradley 3 Ranch

Following her impressive collegiate livestock judging career, Bradley worked for the Texas Angus Association in Fort Worth, learning the difference between quality seed stock cattle and those that win in the show ring.

When she and Bill prepared to marry, they bought 20 cows and the 3,300-acre ranch, quickly learning that the road to a profitable operation was all uphill.

"The old house was in really bad shape," Bradley said. "We had to haul all the water, no telephone, no roads. After we bought it, I got to looking, and nobody had lasted over nine years on the property."

Through trial and error, the Bradley 3 Ranch navigated the many challenges of ranching in west Texas. They learned to install windmills, build fence, improve forage quality and understand stocking rates. Bradley and her husband partnered with local FFA chapters, community colleges and chemical companies to conduct research on stocking rates, genetic traits, fertility, grazing patterns and forage restoration.

"Several years ago, the FFA teacher here in Childress came out and put collars on our cows' necks that would radio back and show where the cows grazed every 10 minutes," Bradley said. "It was eye-opening. They were taking the easy way and only using about 10% of the pasture, going around fence lines and roads."

The ranch responded by removing red berry juniper and mesquite from their East Salt Creek Pasture. The next spring, they sprayed for weeds, and native grasses began to appear. The grama grasses, side oats, blue and hairy grama, the great stirrup high grasses of the 1800s and 1900s began to return. The Bradley 3 Ranch has been recognized for its grassland conservation efforts, and it shows in their numbers. Managing 250 cows was almost impossible those first few years, but after seven decades of range preservation and intensive grazing, the ranch is home to about 400 cows.

"This used to be tallgrass country and we're trying to get it back to tallgrass," Bradley said. "I was always taught to leave whatever you touch better than you found it. You have to have a home for a cow and take care of the grass or whatever you use. Grass is the standard out here, so we always stay in a state of trying to improve."

Early adopters of progressive management

In addition to rangeland conservation efforts, the family has made an even bigger name for itself in herd management strategies and practices. For example, in the early 1960s, the ranch began weighing its cows on the same day their calves were weaned.

"You cannot improve what you do not measure, so we set up a goal for our cows years ago that they had to wean 50% of their body weight every 12 months or they're gone," Bradley said. "If she's open, she's gone. Standardized Performance Analysis says it costs over $1,000 to keep a cow, and there's no way she can make it up if she loses a calf in her lifetime. You love your land, you love your cattle, but you have to run it like a business and make it work for you."

The ranch was also an early adopter of DNA testing, ultrasound technology, EPDs (Expected Progeny Differences), and measuring scrotal circumference and fertility testing in bulls. They launched a major effort to eliminate dwarfism that ran rampant in the 1960s and 1970s.

"A recessive gene in all breeds of cattle took hold as the show ring dominated what bulls should be used across the country," Bradley said. "Dwarfism in seed stock became awful even at Oklahoma A&M. Then there was the idea that if a cow had a dwarf, she herself was a carrier of the dwarf gene, and a bull could be proven clean of the recessive gene if mated to 15 carrier cows. That took at least nine months, and producers were afraid to use the bull on other cows until known clean or a carrier.

"Today at birth, a calf can be identified as a carrier of any known harmful gene by the use of DNA. What a great tool for the industry. We've worked on fertility and with every new development we've come across, we've tried to be ahead of the game," she added.

Bradley 3 Ranch operates on the idea that each cow is an individual and can't be managed as a herd.

"If you name your cows, you're going to lose money," she said. "We're heartless. If they don't produce, they're gone, and that's how we have one of the most fertile herds."

As the cattle industry continues to evolve, Bradley stressed prioritizing the end buyer. Cattlemen and women provide the raw product, but the Beef Quality Assurance (BQA) program builds long-term demand among beef consumers and commercial producers. She encouraged beef producers to become BQA certified. She emphasized the importance of teaching people the right way to give a vaccine, handle cattle, and follow BQA principles. "These are vital to sustaining the industry."

"Now we've got to work on efficiency," Bradley said. "We're losing 2 million acres a year in farm and ranch land. We're to the point where our cows and everything we do must be more efficient. We use liquid feed that can be moved wherever we want the cows to graze instead of overgrazing ground like we used to. There's no more moving west. In today's world of agriculture, we must find ways to produce more with less inputs."

Ranching and farming are not for the weak of heart, and it takes a spirit like hers with a lot of grit to survive the highs and lows of ranching life.

"You've got to love it, and it's rewarding," she said. "You can do it if you've got it in you, but don't think it's going to be easy."

Watch the Minnie Lou Bradley interview on YouTube.

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