It was over breakfast in Nebraska one morning that Dr. John Matsushima was struck with an idea that changed cattle feeding. Dining with Warren Monfort, Louis Dinklage, and Earl Brookover, the men ordered cereal rather…
Years ago, the agriculture trade organization group I was a part of had a booth at a food festival in the shadow of the City and County Building in Denver.
Kihei Matsushima could speak only a bit of English after coming to America from Japan in 1916. His father, Sueji, had come to the states in 1895, making his way working on the railroad across the country to Nebraska and eventually Colorado. After some odd jobs, he found work with a German farmer, Al Leyner, who raised sugar beets near Lafayette, and was able to eventually send for his wife and son. Kihei sent for his wife, Yakuye, in 1918 and their first child, Kiichero, was born on December 24, 1920.
In about 1930, Kihei Matsushima walked high above the Denver Union Stock Yards on the catwalk, as commission men on horseback followed him below as he pointed to pens of cattle he was interested in. A vegetable farmer who still farmed with his father and for the Leyner family, he had a small pasture adjacent to the produce fields that was sitting idle and he had plans to run a few cattle on the grass. A deal was made between Matsushima and the commission man to purchase nine heifers an