Boswell
Family Notes
A Collection of Information about Our Family Before Us
Robert Wiely Sutherland
1890 - 1966
My Grandfather was a Black Angus cattleman. I spent many a weekend at his farm near Montgomery, and every Saturday morning we rode in his pickup truck to feed the herd. He kept a lot of his herd on the "swamp" acerage which he leased from his sister Ruth Moore. She operated her farm as a dairy business. Her son Bobby ran a little motel with a gas station and a golf range there. My treat was a candy bar and I was taught to eat it slowly in small bites so that it would last longer and I could enjoy it more.
The country life was wonderful, but I must admit I should have learned a lot more than I did, i.e. I was spoiled more than I learned how to work. But those days would etch most of my life to come.
I called him Babo, and my Grandmother was Momma. I was fed oatmeal with real cream, bannana pies, and iced tea that I filled with sugar. Life was really sweet back then.
The year before I was born, Babo was featured in the program for the Annual Fatstock Show in Montgomery "Cowtown of the South", with a front page photo and a back page write up about his Great Cow and her offspring.The text of that feature follows:
PATRICIA S 3d 469987
Calved July 4, 1932
Bred by R. W. Sutherland, Mountain City, Tennessee
Now Owned by R. W. Sutherland, Snowdoun, Alabama
The Great Cow featured on the front cover of this catalog is PATRICIA S 3d 469987 bred by R. W. Sutherland, then of Mountain City, Tennessee and now owned by R. W. Sutherland, of Snowdoun, Alabama, Mr. Sutherland having moved to Alabama in 1939 bringing his great cow along in his herd.
HER BREEDING
Patricia is an own daughter of Elliott Marshall 391651 which was an own son of the immortal Earl Marshall 183780 which bull sired the Grand Champion Bulls at the International Livestock Exposition five different years 1921-24 and in 1926. Mind you, these five different bulls were each sired by Earl Marshall and out of different cows which makes it an even greater accomplishment. This makes the sire of our feature cow a half-brother to five different International Grand Champions. That is not all if you look on the bottom side of her pedigree. She is the daughter of Balantina of French Broad 356120 which was an own daughter of the 1920 International Grand Champion bull, the great imported bull, Perinthian 323447. This makes Patricia the daughter of a half-brother to five International Grand Champion Bulls and also a daughter of a cow that was sired by another International Grand Champion Bull. Her breeding surely tells because if one should meet her today in the pasture being followed by her latest son born March 8, 1949 he would likely take her for a cow six or seven years old. Breeding tells and breeding carries on.
HER ACCOMPLISHMENT
In her nearly seventeen years she has delivered to Mr. Sutherland's herd no less than 15 living calves nine of which have been recorded with the American Aberdeen Angus Association and her last calf will soon be so. Five of her offspring have found their way into hands of club boys and girls who have fed and shown them in Tennessee and Alabama and have done better than well with them. Her 1947 son is in this years sale as Lot No.72 and her 1949 calf is already nominated for the 1951 Southern Regional.
If any breeder in Alabama can present us with a picture of a better cow with a greater accomplishment at as advanced years she will likely be featured on the cover of the 1950 catalog of the Southern Regional. Until that time we will call PATRICIA S 3d 469987 The Mother Superior of the Aberdeen Angus breed in Alabama.
Ten years later a bull calf was orphaned. My grandfather brought him back to his farm and hand raised him. On weekends I would help to exercise and train the calf as it was my Snowdoun 4-H project. His name was Smokey. I recall the day we stood the young bull in the pasture for a professional photo. (I had just days before cut my eyebrow sliding into a brick third base over at Bear School, and got 3 stitches out of it. The band aid is on my right eyebrow in that photo, where the scar remains today.) That year at the Alabama State Fair we won as the Grand Champion Angus and Reserve Grand Champion of the whole show. And then we sold him for about $500, with assurances he was to stand at stud and not become hamburger !
Not long after this proud moment, the cattleman sold his herd, and moved to town in no small way. His health was on the down slide, and he passed away too suddenly in 1966 from a failed heart. He had worked hard all of his life and I hope he enjoyed those too few retirement years in the big Garden District house on the corner of Hull Street and Rose Lane, just a block away from Trinity Presbyterian Church. It was hard for me to forgive him for leaving the country, and I was not happy about it at first. But I learned to like his new beautiful home, and the big yard. And Momma's Sunday dinner after church was better than ever. Then we would sit in the easy chairs, watch the news programs on TV, and read the paper. I loved reading his Readers Digest and all of the jokes/funny stories in it.
My brother is named for him, and he named his son also for him. They live today with their family in that big house and have taken great care of it.
With Love and thanks,
Dickie Boswell
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This page last revised March 19, 2006