Dirt Road Charm

Motherhood, Agriculture, and everything in between

Monday, February 4, 2013

"So God Made a Farmer" - Paul Harvey

Sitting in bed online shopping from my phone with the super bowl playing in the background and all of a sudden I get chills and my heart starts racing......I hear Paul Harvey's voice.  I grew up listening to Paul Harvey and the iconic phrase..."And now, the rest of the story".  The Dodge commercial played during the super bowl was hands down the best commercial of the night.  No questions asked!

The words in the video are from the speech that Mr. Paul Harvey gave to the 1978 National FFA Convention.  Here are the words to this wonderful and inspiring speech:

So God Made a Farmer

And on the eighth day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, “I need a caretaker.” So God made a farmer.

God said, “I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, milk cows, work all day in the field, milk cows again, eat supper, then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the township board.” So God made a farmer.

“I need somebody with arms strong enough to wrestle a calf and yet gentle enough to cradle his own grandchild. Somebody to call hogs, tame cantankerous machinery, come home hungry, have to wait for lunch until his wife’s done feeding visiting ladies, then tell the ladies to be sure to come back real soon and mean it.” So God made a farmer.

God said, “I need somebody willing to sit up all night with a newborn colt and watch it die, then dry his eyes and say, ‘Maybe next year,’ I need somebody who can shape an ax handle from an ash tree, shoe a horse, who can fix a harness with hay wire, feed sacks and shoe scraps. Who, during planting time and harvest season will finish his 40-hour week by Tuesday noon and then, paining from tractor back, up in another 72 hours.” So God made a farmer.

God had to have somebody willing to ride the ruts at double speed to get the hay in ahead of the rain clouds and yet stop in mid-field and race to help when he sees the first smoke from a neighbor’s place. So God made a farmer.

God said, “I need somebody strong enough to clear trees and heave bales, yet gentle enough to help a newborn calf begin to suckle and tend the pink-comb pullets, who will stop his mower in an instant to avoid the nest of meadowlarks.”

It had to be somebody who’d plow deep and straight and not cut corners. Somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed, brake, disk, plow, plant, strain the milk, replenish the self-feeder and finish a hard week’s work with an eight mile drive to church. Somebody who’d bale a family together with the soft, strong bonds of sharing, who would laugh, and then sigh and then reply with smiling eyes when his family says that they are proud of what Dad does. “So God made a farmer.”

Here is the super bowl video:

I have a close second which would have to be the Budweiser commercial with the Clydesdale's!

Have a great start to the week and Thank God For Farmers!!
Enjoy~

11 comments:

  1. I enjoyed the commercial and your blog today. Have a great day :)

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  2. Being 4th generation farmers, we too stopped everything and listened to Mr. Harvey as we did in our childhood, and heard the wonderful tribute to the farming community. Thank you for posting it in it's entirety.

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  3. I, myself, am not a farmer. My brother like my father and my grandfather are all farmers. Reading this speech brought tears to my eyes. I have always said that family farming is underappreciated career. May God bless all American farms and the farmers that keep them thriving.

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  4. I am a FFA Advisor. That being said...I really think that the speech given by Mr. Harvey was at the National Farm Bureau Meeting, NOT the National FFA Convention. I can't find the source that tells me that, and when I search for it now, EVERYBODY is crediting FFA. I've used that speech before for FFA purposes (like 3 or 4 years ago), and at that time EVERYBODY credited NFB.

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    1. All the sources I found said the National FFA Convention. Even the origional video from Farms.org that was created a couple years ago. With that being said you could absolutly be correct. I would be interested in seeing if you find a source that states that just for confirmation. Thanks for your feedback!

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    2. The origional video from farms.com not .org. Sorry just wanted to correct that

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    3. Maybe the FFA advisor should do her research?? I assume people that were there in 1978 have forgotten where they were at? I think not. Paul Harvey was given a lifetime membership to the FFA after his speech at the convention, not a National Farm Bureau membership. Check your facts before inserting your foot.

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  5. I ENJOYED THE COMERCIAL WITH PAUL HARVEY

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  6. I was at the national FFA convention 1978 Kansas City Mo Heard Paul Harvey deliver this speech

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    1. That is awesome!! I bet that commercial brought back some memories hearing the speech again! Thanks for sharing!

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  7. He brought back memories of long rides to school, on cold Louisiana mornings... of talks with my Dad over breakfast... of an America, one that I'm sure exists in our hearts, but might need coaxing to the surface... I'm sure that no matter what your persuasions, opinions or leanings are, that Mr Harvey reached you, somewhere with this speech. I wish I had the gift to accomplish this with words.

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