Don’t you just love hearing the personal stories of FFA members across the country? Big, small, seemingly inconsequential or life- altering, they are all inspiring — and unique.
Monte Cummins has been lending a helping hand on the Walker-Carpenter Ranch, which sits on the Duck Valley Indian Reservation in Owyhee, Nev., since he was 8 years old — too small to move a hay bale or drive a four-wheeler but old enough to learn the ropes in farming and ranching.
“From then on, Monte would come and help no matter what we were doing,” says Ryan Carpenter, who co-owns the ranch and serves as the FFA advisor at Owyhee High School. “If it was snowing or raining, if we were branding or feeding cows, Monte was there.”
Today, Cummins, who served as the 2020-21 Duck Valley FFA chapter president, runs his own 20-head herd of Black Angus-cross commercial cows across the wide-open plains in Nevada and Idaho.
But work on the Walker- Carpenter Ranch also allowed Cummins to pursue another passion: leatherworking.
Cummins first learned the traditional craft from his dad. Then, in a shop on the ranch, Carpenter, a professional saddlemaker, encouraged Cummins to tackle larger projects. He now makes headstalls for the horses, cutting the leather, gluing pieces together, shaping and stamping each one until perfect.
“A couple of times, I didn’t expect it to look as good as it did, and it just kind of motivates me to do a better job every time,” Cummins says. “I get to use my creativity, and it’s something I really enjoy doing.” You can read more about Cummins’ craft — and his dedication to keeping ranching traditions alive — in “Nevada Member Honors Ranching Heritage.”
There’s More
In this issue, you’ll also find articles about national convention, tips for starting a new FFA chapter, how to recruit new FFA members, the state of broadband internet in America and more.
Enjoy, and have a great fall!
Justin Davey, Editor, FFA New Horizons, ffanewhorizons@meredith.com
P.S. I also want to introduce you to Kasey Riebel, the incoming editor of FFA New Horizons. While she’s newer to the FFA New Horizons team, she’s not new to FFA. She’s a former chapter president from Nebraska (her supervised agricultural experience was vegetable gardening and helping on her family’s corn and soybean farm). She holds a degree in ag communications and journalism from Texas A&M University. You’ll hear from her in future editions of the magazine.
