Lasting Monument

With the untiring efforts of Travers and others, many became believers in and benefactors of the Simmental dream. Now almost fifty years—a half a century—have come and gone and the name and legacy of Travers Smith is only remembered by a few, but those who knew Travers and what he dreamed and what he accomplished will never forget him. Ted Pritchett wrote:

A fitting tribute to the man was given by his friend, and fellow pioneer breeder, Wayne Malmberg. He said, “The whole North America cattle industry owes Travers Smith a lot of credit because of what he did, and because he did it without a lot of backing or support from anybody.”

There will be no monuments needed for Travers Smith or Parisien. There’s a lasting monument spread across North America. It’s a living and moving monument, made of Simmental breeders, and cattle. Most of all it’s a change of thinking, and an example of what can be done when a man has a dream and works at making it come true. (BeefTodayYearbook’77:88)

ASA Tribute ~ February 1974

[Written by B.Y. Williams; read by Art Linkletter, February 1, 1974, Louisville, Kentucky]

Success is often the baby of failure, tough going and hard times — in short, perhaps better called adversity. The contribution made by Travers Smith to the revolutionizing of the cattle industry in North America through his introduction of the Simmental breed, which proved so successful that it precipitated the stampede into Exotics — was not an exception.

The writer was Manager of a Credit Union and well acquainted with Travers’ banker across the street, but as the old gag goes, “he held no hard feelings against us for keeping him in the cattle business.” I was also in cattle in a small way, and we often discussed the adversities of the business, the virtues of the native breeds — and lack of them — and how to make a living out of a beautiful, big, fat “ideal” Hereford cow that turned in a scrawny 350 pound calf at weaning time. Well, Travers’ contention was that the “egg heads” were all wrong. Presumptuous, of course. Generations of “improvement in the breed” through the theory that the prettiest cow was necessarily the most valuable had downgraded our native breeds to a financial catastrophe. Travers’ contention was that judges of cattle shows should have been judging Miss America contests. Judging cattle by type instead of performance was our ruination, and he found something right at that time to back him up.

The writer, as well as H. J. Blackmore, friend and neighbor, had done some A.I. crossbreeding with Brown Swiss. “Jim” had a three-quarter Brown Swiss bull calf that showed such phenomenal growth that he asked Travers to weigh him with a bunch Travers had on test out of the best Herefords he could find. Result — the ¾ Brown Swiss x ¼ Hereford March calf weaned 878 pounds on November 14, and the heaviest calf Travers had weaned 525 pounds.

Charolais had opened up imports from France the year before. It was January in ‘66. It was a typical day for chewing the fat — there wasn’t much on the cows — but there is always a bit of time for what is better known in the cattle industry as “shooting the bull,” and we decided in that little bull session to shoot off an application to Ottawa and see if a Brown Swiss Bull wasn’t just as importable as a Charolais.

This letter was just being sealed up and stamped the next day when in comes Travers with a full head of steam. “Hold everything, we’ve got the wrong breed. That application should be for a Simmental.” “A what?” says I. “Say man this application is for an import from France, a cattle import, not from South Africa. Simmental — that’s some kind of Gazelle, isn’t it?” “Look,” says Travers, “I didn’t know any more about them than you do till I picked up this magazine today, and here’s an article by Charley Redd, and another by Bert Hargraves, that just happens to say that Simmentals are the best damn cattle in all of Europe, if not the world.”

I grabbed my dictionary — nothing. I grabbed an encyclopedia — nothing. Oh, yes! just over the page under dairy cattle was one sentence. It said something like “a dual purpose breed native to Switzerland.” “Umph,” I said. “Those two guys should know what they’re talking about even if the encyclopedia doesn’t. We’ll never get a permit any way, so here goes,” and the letter headed for Ottawa for a permit to import one Simmental Bull, whatever that might be.

That was that. No answer — in fact we forgot about it until the middle of June. Travers dropped in one day and I said, “Didn’t those guys in Ottawa ever reply to the application we sent off?” “Never a word,” says he. “Well, I’ll be! — I’ll bet we can write a letter they will reply to anyway.” And we did.

Two days later Travers got, a telephone call from Ottawa with apologies and the information that due to an error, his permit application had been overlooked but had been granted. He had until August the 8th to have his calf in farm quarantine in France. Not much time. Five thousand bucks quick, and something to back it up with as needed, and a bull required within less than six weeks. We had no problem with money at the time, not having any. We just decided to raise $500.00 each and get the same amount from a like number of friends, and we were in business.

Travers had contacted Charley Redd previously and he had said, “If you ever get a permit, I want to pick the bull for you.” So Travers got on the phone. No dice. Charley Redd’s calendar was full, so Travers booked the next suitable reservation he could get, as I recall it, for Berne, Switzerland. Switzerland wasn’t open at the time for export, but he wanted a look at the native breed in the country of origin. He told me later that he got acquainted with the Swiss Cattle Breeders’ Federation officials, and then crossed the border into France.

Enter PARISIEN, The Simmental sire of sires, the only million dollar bull in North America. Travers hunted the country for an available bull calf under nine months of age, which had not been vaccinated for foot and mouth disease, both requirements for export. He finally found one, just barely in time to meet the deadline for entering quarantine. It was Parisien or nothing. So that was it. A curious combination of circumstances, luck, tenacity, judgment, courage, and adherence to an idea and an ideal — better cattle.

As anybody knows who has imported cattle from Europe over the years, cattle, like people, fed on and by bureaucracy, don’t seem to thrive. Parisian arrived in April of 1967, a long geared, well spotted, leggy, THIN critter, but growthy. Travers pulled him into Cardston, Alberta about noon one day, and the “knowing” cattlemen had themselves a good laugh. He was promptly dubbed “The red and white Holstein.”

There have been a lot of laughs since that time — cattlemen counting profits from Simmental.

THANKS, TRAVERS, AND A TRIBUTE TO YOU FOR YOUR IDEA AND YOUR IDEALS.

Recognitions

Travers’ untiring efforts to advance the acceptance of the remarkable Simmental breed in North America soon brought him recognition throughout Canada and the U.S. In the space of seven years, he travelled to hundreds of cities, small towns, and rural living rooms to preach the good news of Simmental. He was the featured speaker at many functions and the recipient of many awards and honors. Four are noted below:

▪ In March 1973, he was honored at BYU and received a plaque inscribed with the words: “Recognition Award For Service To Agriculture, Travers Smith 1973, Brigham Young University Biological And Agricultural Sciences.” The speech presenting him read in part: Travers’s unceasing efforts between 1968 and 1972 to extol the virtues of the Simmental cattle is in large measure responsible for the so-called “Exotic” cattle revolution in North America. / We recognize you, Travers Smith, for your contributions to beef cattle improvements in North America. We acknowledge you as a friend of agriculture at Brigham Young University and present this token of appreciation to you for your lectures and participation during Ag. Week 1973.

▪ At the 4th Annual Meeting of the Montana Simmental Association, Travers was made an honorary member and presented with an engraved trophy-clock. An account in the Simmental Shield of February 1974 reads: [Travers] accepted the award with great humility. Thanks for coming, Travers. (p. 136)

▪ The Canadian Simmental Association presented Travers with a plaque and gavel in recognition of his service as the 1st CSA president.

▪ At the American Simmental Association 6th Annual Convention and Banquet in Louisville, Kentucky, Travers was honored on February 1, 1974 and presented in absentia with a hand-carved wooden Simmental cow from Switzerland. His letter of invitation had read in part: Our Board of Trustees voted unanimously at their last meeting to present you with an award for outstanding service to the American Simmental Association.

Travers & Belle were not present at that ASA Convention in Louisville, Kentucky, because the day after Travers mailed acceptance to their letter of invitation he was hospitalized. Despite the eventual diagnosis, Travers had great hopes that he would be healed and be able to attend—to be once again among his friends and fellow-believers in Simmental.

Since Travers’ prayers for recovery were not granted, he composed a message for Belle to send to the gathering that would be honoring him. Belle’s handwritten draft reads:

To Pres. Dale Cutler, all directors, members of A.S.A and all others gathered from Canada and throughout the world. / Praying as I have always done, that God will direct our national, civic and personal lives in attaining a greater performance in service to our fellowmen. / Let us put forth our efforts this night and always to work in this direction, not forgetting that if we do this the blessings of today are but a small portion of what Jesus Christ Our Lord has in store for us both temporally and spiritually. / Let us go now and not fail Him. / Travers Smith.

Noted on the bottom of the draft were the words: Telegram sent to Dale Cutler at the A.S.A Convention the night of Jan 30th 1974.

Art Linkletter, the radio-TV showman and breeder of Simmentals at his Perth Australia ranch read the tribute to Travers (see a later post) that had been written by B.Y. Williams, one of the first investors in SBL. A standing ovation followed the tribute.

Performance Testing for Mankind

Travers' love of his God and his belief that performance testing was not just for livestock was evident to almost all who knew him. His enthusiasm for sharing his beliefs is borne out in the following accounts.

The first comes from the John Schmidt’s … agriculture Alberta column (Calgary Herald) of September 20, 1972. John Schmidt wrote about a cattlemen tour

deep into Mormon country to visit … Simmental Breeders Cardston Ltd., headed by Travers Smith. ... Following lunch, something happened which caught us off base in this computer age, but it demonstrated the fact that cattle men like Travers Smith don’t put all their faith in electronic gadgetry. There is something higher. He presented us all with The Book of Mormon, and gave this profound testimony: “There is one thing more valuable to me than that herd of cattle you saw today. It is this Book. In it you can read about the performance test of human endeavor on this earth.” It was something to make one pause and consider very deeply.

The second account was recorded by Travers' eldest daughter following a December 21, 1973 conversation. On the way home from the Calgary airport, Travers told his daughters about his recent experience in Billings, Montana. His daughter wrote:

The Montana Simmental Assoc. had a conference at which they honored dad in October. ... All the men at the convention were wearing “Thank You Travers” buttons. Mr. Furgeson, the secretary of the organization said a lot, & kind of instigated the affair. When Mr. Furgeson presented Dad with the trophy[-clock] honoring him. He said Dad could answer in only 12 words. [Previously Mr. F. had given Dad a bad time about not being a good enough salesman (not talking enough)]. When Dad replied, he said that he was going to pull a switch on Mr. F. and say a lot. Dad said that the spirit there was really a good spirit so he felt moved to speak on more of a spiritual [plane]. He spoke about performance testing in cattle & compared it to us as God’s children & our performance tests. He referred them to the Bible as being our handbook for personal performance. He also expressed to them that it was by the hand of the Lord that he brought Parisien to Canada. After his testimony the men all came forward and thanked him for his talk not the cattle. The men also honored Mr. Furgeson for all that he had done to keep M.S.A. on its feet. (BYSJ:Jan 9, 1974:44-5)

A third account comes from Tom and Dianne Risinger found at http://www.simmgene.com/pdf/register/40years_208.pdf :

… About the same time, we ran into Charlie Redd from Utah, who had just come back from Europe and he was raving about the Simmental cattle he saw. One day, a really nice, smart, and very intense man named Travers Smith from Cardston, Alberta, came to our house to visit with us about Simmental Cattle. He wore a suit coat with a Book of Mormon in one pocket and a photo album of Simmental cattle in the other. Here was an honest, sincere man who was definitely on a mission and believed in what he was doing. At a meeting in town that night where Travers spoke, we ordered 20 units of semen on a yellow paint calf named Parisien that, at the time, was still waiting to be released from quarantine by Canadian agricultural authorities. ...

... I’ll never forget Travers Smith. He came to visit us when we had only 40 cows and they weren’t even paid for. He had time for anyone who would listen to him. (Tom & Dianne Risinger “40 Years and counting, Part II” by Dan Rieder)