Last week, American Farriers Journal (AFJ) Editor Jeff Cota and I were recapping the great memories flowing in on the history of AFJ, and the advancements that our subscribers are sharing about the world of difference in the industry vs. a half-century ago. After asking me of my observations, Jeff invited me to contribute an “essay” of my own. I was glad to oblige.

I wasn’t around for most of AFJ’s first decade of our family’s ownership of the title. I graduated from Journalism School in 1991, and my dad’s (Frank) business was rebuilding from finding itself on life support after the terrible 1980s. And while I would’ve been happy to work for Dad during my own challenging job search, there wasn’t room at the time. Mom and Dad lost a significant chunk of their business in 1989, 8 years after they hung out their own shingle. But just like nearly every ag business that turned the calendar to the 1990s, they were blessed to survive.

But Dad was convinced I needed to work elsewhere for my own early mentoring and experience. So in between my own job search, I was working part-time as an assistant editor on the 3 small titles Dad edited and produced: Farmer’s Digest, No-Till Farmer and Ridge-Till Farmer. Back then, it was Dad, my mom, Pam (business manager), the late Sue Ramstack (circulation manager) and me. Just 4 of us. After regaining his footing, he was searching for another property to buy, and became interested in a “Magazine for Sale” in a publishing trade magazine. That title was AFJ, which at the time was also the official magazine of the American Farriers Association (AFA).

After a few weeks of review, Dad told me to pack a bag. We were headed to Worcester, Mass., just west of Boston, to seal the deal. And while meeting with the publisher (Dean Laux, Laux Company) and the attorneys. I would get a first-hand look at the closing of an important business deal.

That was a memorable trip for many reasons. I was tasked with the AAA maps, hotel reservations and the all-important dining and entertainment decisions.

I remember a brief meeting with a couple of the Laux staffers and loading up our rented cargo van with the entire library of AFJ editions, trade show displays and the printer films (yes, it was film back then) of all the advertising and page layouts.

And we pulled over in Erie, Pa. for me to follow up with the publisher of Modern Casting, a metals manufacturing magazine and trade association in Illinois, who offered me the associate editor job. I got to absorb Dad’s career advice, and I called back the next day to accept the gig and plan my move to Illinois.

It was interesting, as we were both entering a largely unknown world. Dad had draft horses at the farm as a kid, and I’d taken a foundry class in high school shop. But that was it for both of us. We were both entering a “metalworking trade” about the same time – he with covering the forge, tongs and hammers, and me with the giant cupolas, electric-arc and induction furnaces.

But that trip wasn’t ALL business. As a 22-year-old, we made the most of the father-son trip while we had the time together. We made time for Baseball’s Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., and at least one VCR rental at the hotel to rent a movie on the way home. Yup, that’s how it was done in budget motels back in early 1992.

Early Successes

Before we even arrived back with the AFJ materials, Mom and Dad had already had their sights set on Alice Musser as the one and only candidate for Advertising Manager. She’d never sold an ad in her life, but their previous work together in the mid-1980s had proven that she could do anything they asked of her. And they lured her back.

So, Dad, Alice and their new managing editor, Mike Gallenberger (Dad tasked me with screening candidates before I left) saw an almost immediate success with the new acquisition. My parents swiftly moved the company out of the spartan industrial 3-room “office” to professional quarters on the other side of town.

Dad paid the note off from Laux far earlier than scheduled, freeing him from debt worries and allowing him to plow every nickel back into the business. I would stop in the offices on occasion when up for business from Illinois, and the enterprise I’d said goodbye to as I left for Illinois in January 1992 was barely recognizable. New computers, an art department, full-time marketing folk and a hardworking crew to support Dad’s vision.

Brings Us to 2003 ...

What I thought might be a couple of years in Illinois turned into 12 before I answered the call to come back to the family business in September 2003 and moved my wife and son back to Wisconsin. And the change of scenery in Wisconsin would bring 2 more sons to the family.

Late 2003 was an interesting time. A year or so earlier, the AFA arrangement for a free subscription to all members dissolved over Dad’s refusal to yield editorial control. This also meant that AFA members would have to subscribe to the magazine on their own, which required more circulation management and investment than before.

And in that summer of 2003 before I came back, AFJ announced a new kind of educational event and Trade Show, the International Hoof-Care Summit (IHCS), that would debut in Cincinnati in the winter of 2004.

We were all excited by the IHCS, which I knew would put Alice’s and Frank’s talents back to work. The pair had worked on another national Trade Show before the changes in Dad’s business, but shortly after Alice’s return in 1992, he launched another highly successful ag educational conference, which is 2025 will be its 33^rd anniversary.

My Indoctrination to Farriery

I’d once handled photography alongside Dad at the U.S. Equestrian Team Olympic Trials in New Jersey as he interviewed Hall of Famer Seamus Brady. But that was the extent of my experience in farriery before moving back to Wisconsin in the fall of 2003.

During my first week on the job, Alice made sure I got off on the right foot. She scheduled a meeting and drove me out to see the Farrier Hall of Famer, and future friend (and eventual technical editor), Red Renchin. It was a great day; Red was also hosting Hall of Fame farrier Hank McEwan from British Columbia, and Illinois track shoer Joe Trhlik at his shop.

Talk about a first impression. We spent several hours in the shop before he took all of us and his assistants out for a prime-rib sandwich in town. I’d return to see Red a short time later to write my first article for AFJ on his self-built shoe-bender.

And then that winter, before our own event, Alice, Dad and I hit the Bluegrass Laminitis Symposium in Louisville, run by Doc Redden and his family. It was a “drinking from the fire hose,” for sure, the depth of technical information was overwhelming. But I got the chance to meet a lot of great minds and enjoyed a memorable dinner – with the waitress splitting up the tab into more than 30 tickets -- at the 25th floor of the Galt House Hotel. I’ve never forgotten that night, and the folks we call friends decades later.

I believe the Symposium was the first in which I participated in the “Farrier Focus Groups.” These were fun, insightful gatherings where we’d buy drinks and dinner in a private room -- and go deep with a half-dozen farriers about their needs and challenges, and how to be of better use to them as an industry resource. There was always a lot of candor about the industry, and laughs, of course. We’d go home with notebooks full of story ideas, new sources and developments to pay attention to.

Shortly after my first winter back in the business and IHCS off and running, I was pulled to other areas of our growing business, including to oversee 3 farm magazines we acquired in mid-2004. Dad, Alice and Managing Editor Pat Tearney looked after AFJ and the IHCS, while I was tasked with rescuing 3 “left for dead” titles we acquired from a big publisher who’d given up on them.

Observations on an Interesting Trade

But it was at the first IHCS, and in most of the following 22 years, that I got to understand what a unique industry this had been.

And from that deeper understanding of the audience at IHCS came an all-new website and new weekly newsletter, both primitive by today’s standards but got the job done.

At the first IHCS, it was apparent how important the peer-to-peer relationships were to an industry that was often toiling on its own all day long. The ones who made the trek to the IHCS deeply WANTED the interaction with their fellow professionals; they wanted to know their peers and exchange ideas and learn how they responded to the unique cases they saw. It was unlike anything I’ve seen before, but I understood it once I realized how isolated the craft can be at times.

Our editors and I have covered dozens of trades and business segments, but the farrier niche is very different. Some can be the most challenging audience to satisfy, but most will also step up and in to help us figure out how to serve them better.

And this is not an industry where personal and professional lives don’t intersect. I’ve watched the friendships that blossomed not only between farriers, but also with our staff. The fact that Alice’s iPhone still rings with farriers and farrier suppliers nearly a decade after her retirement shows how deep relationships run in this business.

Most satisfying to hear as an owner of AFJ and IHCS are the stories of our contribution to the trade. AFJ Founder Henry Heymering got it all started, and our team picked up his mantle and compounded its impact. As you’re seeing in other contributions from the industry, the trade has emerged from the dark ages in the past 50 years. And we’ve been blessed to be part of it, and able to chronicle those developments as they’ve occurred in real time.

Forever Thankful

Had it not been for the success of AFJ, I may not have been able to rejoin my parents’ small media company. Ten years of success allowed the room for me to come back and funded the subsequent acquisitions we made. And that allowed the investment in additional top-talent staff that we wanted to make to better serve you, our loyal subscribers.

Thank you, and cheers to the next 50 years!