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Delivering more than the beefBy Trent Loos The Houston E. Mull FFA Memorial Scholarship Cattle Drive has come and gone for a fourth year and this one will never be forgotten. Picture this, if you can: I am riding a pink mule, carrying a United States flag and being followed by 300 people on horseback and 55 Texas Longhorns, six miles cross country and then through the community of Malta Bend, Mo. The plan had been for me to carry that flag the entire time and to lead the excursion. But one sorrel horse had other ideas when we hit Malta Bend, near the end of the drive. Houston E. Mull was a farm kid that I met in the spring of 2004. He displayed more pride about his rural heritage and his dream to be a farmer than any kid I had ever met. He was taken from us at the young age of 15 on July 1, 2004, in a motor vehicle accident. In an attempt to keep the legacy of this young man alive, we organized a cattle drive near Marshall, Mo., in the fall of 2004. Friends and family gathered for an emotional event that initiated this celebration of life in rural America that has grown to what it is today. Two weeks prior to this year's drive, we decided to add a cancer component to the event. The Fitzgibbon Hospital in Marshall, Mo., has designed plans to add a cancer wing at the hospital. The construction will begin after the funds are raised for the wing. Robin and Brenda Mull, Houston's parents, decided to offer one of the longhorns used in the drive for the benefit auction, with the proceeds to go to the Cancer Center. I decided to ride a pink mule to honor the victims and survivors of breast cancer. One woman every three seconds is diagnosed with breast cancer. My riding a pink mule seems like a small price for me to pay to bring awareness about the disease that has affected both my mother and my sister (twice). One week prior to the cattle drive, John Simpson, who listens to Loos Tales on KMMO Radio, called to tell me how much he truly appreciates that I promote Red Shirt Friday on the air. We are Americans in Agriculture and we support our troops by wearing a red shirt every Friday, to thank them for their service to our country. John Simpson received a flag that had flown at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, from Captain Daniel Swanson, who is serving his second tour of duty. John offered to donate the flag to us for use in the cattle drive. I felt it would be a tremendous opportunity to carry the flag to say thank you to all of the military men and women who have ever served our country. I carried that flag, with pride, for 30 miles over the course of three days, while riding a pink mule. On Saturday November 3, 2007, the day of the main cattle drive, I made it very clear to everyone that I thought all the riders should allow the flag to lead the way. We had traveled six miles to the community of Malta Bend with everyone honoring our nation's colors, when the horse ridden by 13-year old Dawn Gorrell showed his intention of leading us through town. Brenda Mull hollered to Dawn to keep her horse behind the flag but Dawn said she couldn't hold him back. This horse had been riding without one challenge until this point, but now he decided he knew where he was supposed to be. The horse, Sonny, led us through his hometown of Malta Bend. Sonny just happens to have been owned by the young man who created the opportunity for us to come together each year and celebrate everything good about life in rural America--Houston E. Mull--and it was obvious that he was with us on this Saturday in Missouri. As we arrived back at the Mull Farm that afternoon, people lined up to have their picture taken with Toby, the pink mule. Anyone who was willing to make a free-will donation to the Cancer Center got to have their picture taken on Toby. All of the donors' names were placed in a hat for a drawing for a quilt--a pink breast cancer awareness quilt. Later in the evening Kristi Boedaker, a three-time cancer survivor fromthe Marshall area, drew Heather Arth's name out of the hat. Heather Arth, a cancer survivor herself, was the first to have her picture taken with the mule earlier in the day. Over 700 people enjoyed the steak feed and took home wonderful items that had been made and donated to the benefit auction. For so many reasons, I think you can see why this will be remembered as a blessed event. In its first three years of existence, the Houston Mull Scholarship Fund has awarded over $20,000 in scholarships to local FFA students. The 2007 Cattle Drive generated another $20,000 for the fund, as well as $3,400 for the Fitzgibbon Cancer Center. Houston E. Mull touched so many lives in his short 15 years here on earth and now he has found a way to continue putting smiles on people's faces at an accelerated rate. The only way to describe the events last week in Central Missouri is "the epitome of everything good about life in rural America!" I hope you will consider joining us next year. Editor's note: Trent Loos is a sixth generation United States farmer, host of the daily radio show, Loos Tales, and founder of Faces of Agriculture, a non-profit organization putting the human element back into the production of food. Get more information at www.FacesOfAg.com, or e-mail Trent at trent@loostales.com. 11/12/07 Date: 11/8/07
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