40 March 26, 2015 2015 Logan County Farm Outlook Magazine Lincoln Daily News.com
Often this is the case with Ag related products; a
good year in the field, coupled with reasonably
good prices, will start a domino effect that brings in
higher fertilizer and seed costs in the next cycle. A
bad year can bring price reductions.
On the flip side, when petroleum prices fall,
statistics show that ethanol consumption decreases,
causing a surplus and creating a lack of demand for
corn. The cycle continues on with less demand for
corn, it is devalued further. So what is saved could
also be lost.
Right now, economists predict crude oil is going
to stay possibly well below $100/barrel throughout
most of 2015. The fact is, they don’t have a crystal
ball, and they can’t know anything for certain. What
we do know though is that on the farm, it will take
at least 12 months before lower crude prices have a
significant effect on profitability.
Story by Nila Smith
Mr. Allen and
the Mount Pulaski
FFA, a natural fit
Ralph Allen grew up on a farm in Delavan and
always wanted to be a farmer. “It’s just kinda
in your blood,” says Allen, referring to his first
passion in life. Then he figured out he wanted to be
a teacher the fall after he graduated from Delavan
High School.
That fall he attended the University of Illinois for
two weeks and then came back to the family farm.
“Some things changed on the farm and I came home
to help Dad get the harvest in and he set me up in
the operation,” Allen says.
Then one day he went to help his high school Ag
teacher harvest the FFA plot. “It was that day that
I watched him and I had been in FFA and I decided
that was what I wanted to do.”
Allen discovered his second passion that day,
returned to the U of I in January and enrolled in
Ag Education. Four years later, he was getting
set to graduate and he made a phone call to Bob
Maske, a teacher at Mount Pulaski High School.
“I was sitting in a professor’s office at the U of I
looking at Ag programs in the state and I saw Mount
Pulaski and it said, “No Ag Classes - FFA only -
Bob Maske, Advisor.” As he made the phone call
to Maske, he had to sell not only himself but also
the need for an Ag program at Mount Pulaski High
School.
Maske was sold and Allen then had to reach out
to the administration. “A lot of this new science
curriculum was coming out and FFA was changing.
There were a lot of jobs out there and a lot of
potential for Ag students and this community needed
it anyway,” Allen explained. Fortunately, for Allen
and for Mount Pulaski, he was hired as a part-time
teacher and FFAAdvisor and he was still able to
continue farming 400 acres on the side.
Continued to page 41
