What is the measure of a farmer at twilight?
Record yields, big dollars, giant acreage? All for naught, says Stan DeBoer.
“The only things that mattered were the Good Lord, my wife, my daughters, and helping other farmers,” he insists. “The rest was noise.”
A strongbox of a man with python arms, hands of stone, every inch of 6’4”, dark hair flowing under a trucker hat, garbed in t-shirt, Levi’s, and cowboy boots on Nebraska dirt, DeBoer was a force of nature. Think Elvis with muscles.
Decades ahead of his time, DeBoer rode risk as an ethanol pioneer, Tractorcade driver, irrigation innovator, gubernatorial candidate, and vital player during the wildest soybean heist in U.S. history, each endeavor toe-tagged with an undeniable maxim—first bird to fly gets all the arrows.
In the FBI’s labyrinthine basement, at the back of a forgotten filing cabinet, a surveillance file surely exists on the activities of a renegade DeBoer. Likely spilled across the first memo: This Nebraska farmer is a born leader, keeps his word at all costs, and stirs the passions of fellow producers. Stan DeBoer is a damn problem.
Roll the Dice
In 1938, on the flats of Gosper County in southcentral Nebraska, a stick-built home with no electricity or plumbing saw the birth of DeBoer. Six months later, after surrounding land was slated for the bottom of a 2,000-acre irrigation reservoir, DeBoer’s father, George, put the bare-bones home on wheels, and as bread dough baked in the tiny kitchen’s wood stove, he rolled the structure to dry ground roughly a section distant—supper ready on arrival, still warmed by the waning embers.
The bliss of a rural childhood doglegged in 1945 after the loss of DeBoer’s mother, Effie, to cancer. With George punching a clock at an ammunition naval depot in nearby Hastings, young DeBoer spent every summer into his teens chasing the shadow of an older brother, Bryce, working corn and soybean rows in Cozad, 100 miles west of Hastings. Farming became DeBoer’s outlet—and gameplan in life.
“What I was doing in those fields was a disaster, but fall still came every year,” he says. “Bryce looked out for me and he became like a second father. I learned and learned, and it stirred an internal desire to farm.”
At an early age, DeBoer hoed his own row beyond farming, and at a head taller, he kept an eye out for the weaker party. “Maybe nothing bothered me as much as someone pushing down an underdog. I was always capable of defending myself, and I did likewise with my friends. I never worried about sharing the same opinion with the crowd.”
At high school’s end, DeBoer clawed for a toehold in agriculture. Despite no father in farming and no family land, he possessed unshakeable belief and a willingness to roll the dice.
“Risk has always been farming,” explains DeBoer, now 86. “I was never afraid of debt. I’d go buy a tractor tomorrow, because the moment you make that purchase and drive away onto the road, you’ve made a statement: ‘You believe.’”
Eighteen-year-old DeBoer was certain his future ran along a straight line to farming—until a young lady crawled under his 1951 Mercury 4-door.
It was obvious: She was the one.
Dark Elvis
Born by fire. Literally.
In 1940, heavily pregnant Vivian Nielsen, along with her husband, Herman, scrambled to put out a prairie fire adjacent to the couple’s dairy operation. The exertion triggered the premature birth of Bonnie Nielsen—raised to weather every wind of the farming life.
When Herman wasn’t tending cows, he drank coffee by the pot at the Dixie Inn in Cozad; it was his office. In early 1958, 18-year-old Bonnie walked into her father’s haunt and slid into a booth just as DeBoer entered the joint.
DeBoer eyeballed the girl with hair spun from sunshine. DeBoer was thunderstruck by the dairyman’s daughter. Dark Elvis met blonde beauty.
“I remember the exact booth where Bonnie was sitting,” he says. “I just happened to know the girl she was with, and I walked over to them. Bonnie was a nurse’s aide at the hospital, so I asked if I could drive her to work.”
On the road into town, DeBoer’s tire caught a nail. A most fortuitous puncture.
“I got out to change the tire, and the next thing I knew, Bonnie was laying on the ground, helping to fix the flat. I knew right then she was the best thing ever to happen to me—the luckiest night of my life. I was afraid she might not be real.”
Real, indeed. Bonnie was golden-hearted, steel-backboned, razor-tongued.
Months later, the Nebraska teens walked the aisle. Truly, a matched pair.
“She was my everything and my world to this day,” DeBoer says, his voice breaking. “A lover, and I have five children to prove it. A hugger, and I have a widespread community to prove it. A homemaker, and I have the quality of my lifetime to prove it. What role didn’t she play?”
“Bonnie guarded our home, patterned five daughters after herself, and was beside me for every farming step I ever took,” DeBoer adds. “Of every event to come in our life, she was never afraid. All the dumb ideas I had were never dumb to Bonnie, and that made the world easy to conquer.”
The pieces were in place for a monumental farming life.
Return to the Plow
Presenting his bride with a pink, two-bedroom home north of Cozad, DeBoer’s domestic bliss contrasted with an agricultural operation stretched painfully thin—one well and a handful of cattle. “Generally, we were raising 100-bushel corn and getting $1 per bushel, with the elevator probably taking a nickel. Inputs were cheap, but accumulation of money was impossible. I don’t remember holding a $100 bill in that era, and very few $20 bills.”
At 22, DeBoer talked his way into a temporary carpentry job (along with Army Reserve duty) with AT&T to build a link in a chain of line-of-site towers. “I should have paid them for the lifetime of knowledge I gained in five months,” he says. “I never stopped using those skills on the farm.”
When AT&T’s Cozad construction was completed, the outfit boss approached DeBoer with a lucrative work offer at another location, and a potential spot in the leadership chain.
DeBoer returned to his plow.
11-Mile Snake
When old money owns the land, sometimes a switch is in order.
In 1966, DeBoer pulled stakes and moved his family 30 miles southeast to the edge of Bertrand in Gosper County, trading the little pink house for a curiosity hidden behind a vast curtain of sunflowers. The inner core of DeBoer’s new home was an old railroad depot.
He worked rented ground for $300 per month and a fifth of the yield. His first year, targeting 125-bushel irrigated corn, he rolled snake eyes: The crop was hailed out for a total loss. Roll’em again.
Row by row, field by field, DeBoer pieced together an operation into the 1970s, but as he navigated between stability and prosperity on his own ground, commodities nosedived and the agriculture economy plummeted in tandem, pulling down farms across the U.S.
“We were like so many other farmers—always extending the numbers to go one more year,” DeBoer recalls. “Always having to convince a lender to go again. Something had to change. And it can never just be about solving your own farm problems: What about all those farmers coming after you? There’s right, wrong, and responsibility in farming, and part of that is trying to work for change beyond your own lifetime.”
In 1977, amid the agricultural maelstrom, 350 miles southwest of DeBoer in Baca County, Colorado, five farmers seeded the American Agriculture Movement (AAM), aimed at two basic principles. One, parity: A fair price on crops to just cover the costs of production and enable a farmer to make a survivable living. Two, country of origin labeling (COOL).
A true populist surge, with no official leadership, AAM exploded via local farmer meetings and phone trees, resulting in a series of protests at county, state, and national levels. Ringleader by example, DeBoer leaped into the fray. Tip of the spear by nature.
Foremost among the protests was the 1979 Tractorcade (DeBoer also participated in numerous AAM events and provided congressional testimony on Capitol Hill about the state of U.S. ag) to Washington, D.C.—an epic 5,000-tractor farmer army that crossed the continent at the height of winter in four separate convoys. The producers rumbled into the nation’s capital and occupied the National Mall, demanding Congress address the realities of an agriculture industry in collapse.
DeBoer’s Tractorcade branch set out for D.C. from North Platte, Neb., in January: 100 miles per day, 8 mph, dark morning to dark evening, 17 days on the road with snowfall on each day, including a blizzard.
At its furthest, the line of tractors and support vehicles snaked 11 miles—including the steady roll of an International 1256 with Bonnie at the wheel.
Fellow Tractorcade participants Eugene and Laurie Schroder (son and daughter-in-law of Gene Schroder, one of AAM’s five original Campo, Colo., founders) recall DeBoer and Bonnie. “Stan was so well-respected,” Eugene says. “So big and strong that he always stood out, but known more for being trustworthy. The whole family was that way, just outstanding.”
“Bonnie was a miracle lady,” Laurie echoes. “A blondie with a smile always on her face, yet so tough. A kind touch and looked so nice, but tough as nails.”
In a moss gold, 1976 Chevy pickup, DeBoer drove point ahead of the tractor train, negotiating with law enforcement to find highways and resting stops at amusement parks, fairgrounds, and parking lots.
Concerned over the D.C.-bound procession, the FBI dropped moles into the procession, garbed in blue-collar clothing. “At least from Galesburg, Ill., the government had plants with us dressed up like farmers,” DeBoer notes. “The message had hit Washington that we were truly coming, and they did their best to stall us on the road, because they knew we were going to converge with the other tractor trains and roll into town together.”
Scouting in front of the 11-mile snake, DeBoer was told by highway patrolmen to change routes, away from a major highway. Bulldog with a bone, DeBoer was not a man to be pushed. “I told them, ‘No way.’ I said, ‘Why don’t you drive back to the guys in the tractors and try telling each one which way they can go?’ That settled it.”
Once in D.C., DeBoer, alongside producer Corky Jones, became the voice of Nebraska farmers. Every day, inside the offices of congressional reps on Capitol Hill, DeBoer laid out the why’s and how’s of the agriculture crisis and the extreme need for change.
Each night, he walked the farmer encampment stretched across the mall between Capitol Hill and the Washington Memorial. “I’d go from facility to facility to the trucks and trailers to answer questions. We’d have a final meeting at a motel each night, and every state had at least one representative individual. So many of us were fighting for our very farm existence.”
Several months later, the last remnant of AAM producers left D.C. “We tore up and reseeded the mall before we left,” DeBoer describes. “No doubt, we left it in better shape than we arrived. Did we do any good in Washington? We sure tried.”
After the 1979 Tractorcade and participation in other farmer protests in multiple states, with reputation building and profile expanding, DeBoer jumped headfirst into a buck-wild grain heist.
The Great Soybean Raid
In January 1981, in open defiance of the federal government, producer Wayne Cryts announced his intention to steal 32,000 bushels of his own soybeans held at the bankrupt Ristine elevator in New Madrid County in southeast Missouri.
The soybeans, despite being grown and owned by Cryts, were considered part of the elevator’s bankruptcy losses. Cryts selected Feb. 16, George Washington’s birthday, as the day of liberation—the Great Soybean Raid.
Over 750 miles northwest of Ristine, DeBoer and Bonnie were incensed by the news of Cryts’ plight. Already on the federal radar after the AAM protest involvement in Washington, and despite nothing to gain except a felony prison sentence, they hit the highway, bound for the Missouri Bootheel. Arriving at the Ramada Inn in Sikeston, where Cryts was preparing for the logistics of the breakin-breakout with trucks and bucket brigades, DeBoer immediately threw his weight and reputation into the fray.
Recalling DeBoer’s support, Cryts is deeply grateful—and still impacted 44 years onward. “Stan DeBoer. Stan DeBoer,” Cryts repeats with emphasis. “Let me tell you about Stan DeBoer.”
“The first time I met Stan, he was somebody I respected from the first words he said and the standout way he conducted himself: A man of truth. The guy you want in your corner.”
“He was such an impressive physical specimen,” Cryts describes. “I’d say he had to be 6’4” or taller, and his wife, Bonnie, was a very nice-looking lady. Taken together, they were an awesome looking pair—really special. Hook’em up together to any wagon and they could pull it. Guaranteed.”
DeBoer and a host of other farmers from Missouri and the Midwest were prepared, short of violence, to physically retrieve Cryts’ crop. “We wanted the American people to know exactly what was going on,” DeBoer says. “We hid nothing. I got on television and did an interview that night, letting everyone know what the government was up to and why we were taking the beans the next day.”
Surrounded by nervous U.S. marshals and FBI agents, DeBoer faced a genuine prospect of imprisonment. “They were tired of us and they had already experienced several months of us in Washington. Yes, I knew they recognized me by then, but I didn’t care. I was helping Wayne Cryts no matter what. If not, I could be next, or any farmer could be next. I could never just sit back on my own farmland and watch bad things happen to another farmer.”
At 10 a.m., Feb. 16, before the eyes of U.S. marshals and FBI agents, Cryts and a massive throng of farmers entered the Ristine elevator grounds, loaded almost 80 trucks (over two days), and drove away with 32,000-plus bushels of soybeans. Pressure cooker rattling, the feds stood down.
“I was in and out of the elevator office, dealing with federal authorities,” Cryts explains. “While the raid was going, there were a lot of guys out there who listened to Stan’s opinion of how to proceed. That’s how influential he was; that’s how powerful his reputation was.”
And when the trucks were loaded and leaving, after the intensity of the action waned, how did DeBoer behave? No glory; no backslapping. He organized the grating and cleaning of the elevator grounds.
“That’s my last memory of Stan,” Cryts says. “I saw him leading by example. I saw him and Bonnie walking around the elevator, holding a bag, and humbly picking up trash and cigarette butts out of the gravel. There they were, 1,000 miles from home, helping me for no other reason than they believed it was the right thing to do. Says a lot about a man. Says a lot about a woman. Says a lot about them.”
On the elevator grounds, federal officers recorded every name and action. And DeBoer was already on their radar, Cryts says.
“I want to go on record and make people realize what I believe is the most important part of the whole deal,” Cryts emphasizes. “After Ristine, it was always said, ‘Wayne Cryts has courage.’ Let me tell reality. I acted out of desperation. The real courage on display was by Stan DeBoer and others there like him. Why? They jeopardized all they had for someone they didn’t know, and they knew they could get hurt, injured, in jail, or pay lifetime penalties—all of those consequences were very, very real. I’m saying Stan and Bonnie were the people with everything to lose, and that is rare courage in farming or any part of life.”
“Justice and freedom don’t depend so much on standing up for yourself as they do for standing up for others,” Cryts emphasizes. “That’s what Stan believes and that’s how he lived his life. I’ll never, never forget what he did. Stan DeBoer put his head in the noose for me.”
After the surreal raid at Ristine, firmly in federal crosshairs, DeBoer risked it all on a giant brew of corn and milo—fuel alcohol.
Keep the Wolves Away
In 2023, ethanol contributed $54.2 billion to GDP and sucked up roughly 40% of all U.S. corn yield—an industry partially built on the shoulders of DeBoer and other likeminded farmers who laid the foundation stones of modern renewable fuels.
In 1981, DeBoer and his three farming brothers visited the Schroder family in Baca County, Colorado, to eyeball a fledgling ethanol operation. Remarkably visionary, the Schroders erected one of the first ethanol plants in U.S. history, built from scratch.
By hand, DeBoer and his siblings then constructed Nebraska’s first ethanol plant of sizable production—mild steel and 10,000-gallon tanks. “It was a financial opportunity for myself and a bigger one for my entire region. We could see how the future was shaping up.”
Right idea; wrong time. After trial and error, DeBoer hit the wall.
“Our plant worked so well, but it didn’t matter. We didn’t have the volume needed, and when the corn price went up 40 cents, and we couldn’t rely on the cattle industry to take our byproducts, we were in trouble. Additionally, we should have built with heavy stainless, but we didn’t know that earlier. Bottom line and final problem: Our debt limit.”
When the funds ran out, DeBoer and his brothers took an ethanol bath. “We had no means to pay what we owed. The only solution was closure. If you’re going into a venture and you don’t recognize the numbers, be careful. If you don’t have that number to lose, you better think hard. I didn’t listen, and it all ended on the debt line. A life of debt. That was me.”
No blame. No self-pity. Just a fight to keep the wolves away.
On countless late nights in the 1980s, consumed by angst over his wife and daughters and the dismal state of agriculture, DeBoer walked the floor of Kirk’s truck stop outside Lexington, alongside a cohort of other farmers who couldn’t sleep. Their world looked different when the sun came up.
“The average outsider would just tell us to work harder and rent more land,” DeBoer says. “Sure, but when you have outside factors undercutting that, you better react. You better make sure the politicians care about what the country has for dinner.”
Words backed by action. DeBoer ran for governor.
Refusing the Plum
In 1982, with minutes to go before deadline, DeBoer filed paperwork and entered Nebraska’s gubernatorial race. “The guy in office (Charles Thone) had little care for the problems of agriculture, and my objective was to get him out.”
At 42, DeBoer was still a physical presence, explains his grandson, Isaac Kuck.
“He’d never lifted weight in his life, unless you count tractor weights,” Kuck says. “At one of the primary debates, the candidates were sitting on stage and the guy beside my pop was leaning back in his chair, when the legs slid off the edge. Pop saw it happening and reached back with a single, giant hand on the back of the guy’s neck to keep him from crashing backwards and getting a serious injury. Incredible strength.”
DeBoer fared well in rural communities—but his campaign lacked the financial legs of other candidates. In 1982, Bob Kerrey was elected as governor of Nebraska. In the aftermath, over dinner, Kerrey offered DeBoer a plum job in his administration.
“I suppose a lot of people would have taken the offer,” DeBoer reflects. “No, thanks. I went back to plowing.”
Back to his fields. Back to his Chevy pickup. Back to life as a creature of habit—leaving the rows at midday to answer the dinner bell and drink a glass of tea. Back to Bonnie.
A Farmer at Twilight
In 1981, a year prior to his gubernatorial run, DeBoer was blessed with the first of a “cream of the crop” fleet of 20 grandchildren and 34 great-grandchildren, a figurative beginning for his finest years—all devoted to family and friends.
In 2003, he handed the business end of the plow to his younger brother, Byron, and nephew, Jesse, still maintaining a mild hand in the operation. A workaday farm grind changed to mentorship, countless hours coaxing wood into handcrafted masterpieces (still to this day), and attention to a flowerbed and prosperous garden alongside Bonnie.
In July 2023, over 40 years past the peaks and valleys of tractorcades, grain grabs, and ethanol endeavors, Bonnie passed away at 83.
DeBoer pauses, gathers his emotions at her memory, his voice shaking. “Together. Always. Me and her. I’ll tell any man out there: If you are fortunate enough to marry a lady that is of the same mindset, you will be a tough pair to duel with.”
Hands-on, or indirectly, DeBoer and Bonnie impacted the lives of thousands of farmers and rural Americans—repeatedly standing in the gap with no gain at hand. See a need, meet a need.
“Theirs is a story where financials are not the determiner of wins and losses,” Kuck says. “My pop was never afraid to dream, and those dreams are what helped make others successful today.”
A man ahead of his time, DeBoer refused the comforts of status quo in favor of risk and rectitude. At every juncture of his farming life, DeBoer had the option to stay within the bounds of his own rows. Each time, he chose otherwise: “I’m a right and wrong fellow. I’d take any of those risks again if I thought it would help us all. Every risk was worth it because I have grandsons and nephews in farming now. I’ll tell them or anyone younger: Protect your ears; be careful with desire; don’t follow the crowd; and never believe anybody has magic.”
Full circle, what is the measure of a farmer at twilight? The integrity of Stan DeBoer.
“At the end of life, what does a man want on his tombstone? I hope mine says, ‘Helped the Underdog Farmer, Loved His Family, and Loved the Good Lord.’” DeBoer concludes. “Nothing else ever mattered.”
For more from Chris Bennett (@ChrisBennettMS or cbennett@farmjournal.com or 662-592-1106), see:
Corn and Cocaine: Roger Reaves and the Most Incredible Farm Story Never Told
