The annual American Agriculture Movement Inc., National Convention took place Jan 9 – 10 in Lubbock Texas.

Nineteen states were represented: Kansas, Arkansas, Illinois, Colorado, Texas, Nebraska, Florida, Tennessee, Connecticut, Washington, Missouri, Idaho, Wisconsin, Georgia, Maryland, Minnesota, California, Iowa and New Mexico.

The two states most represented were Kansas and Texas!

As the Youth Ag Ambassador chair I’d like to highlight their experience at convention.

August Carson of White City, Dally Emig of Abilene, Haylee Nielsen of Council Grove and myself (Crystal Carson) struck out Thursday morning about 7 a.m. from the Central Station in White City.

We made a tour around noon through the Dalton Gang hideout in Meade, which has many ranching and farming artifacts as well. We made it into Amarillo to tour the American Quarter Horse Association Hall of Fame and museum about 3:45 p.m. before arriving at the MCM Elegante hotel in Lubbock shortly after 6 p.m.

Our ambassadors attended board meetings, Parity Fund lunches and convention sessions where they watched how business sessions are conducted, listened to speakers, became up to date on farm politics, current affairs and heard organization financial reports.

They met National Association of Farmer Elected Committee associates (NAFEC). They heard first hand as farmers reported on their struggles and coping mechanisms and listened as resolutions were formed to be sent on to lobby the higher political forces as well as other organizations AAM collaborates with.

While in Lubbock we visited the beloved Ranching Heritage Museum and the FiberMax Discovery Center for learning. We were also invited to tour the Agri Stem Lubbock public school facility.

It was inspiring to see an agriculture-only high school. What an example that Lubbock public high schools are setting, leading the way in agricultural education with 4 sectors of classrooms including Plant/Floral Science labs, Vet Science lab, Meat/Food Science labs, and a Wildlife lab. All are nestled on 30 acres near Texas Tech, students are bussed in for double blocks.

Students utilize an indoor arena, an SAE barn and are looking forward to Ag Mechanics and a greenhouse addition soon.

The evening of our FiberMax tour the Ambassadors enjoyed a real Chuck wagon fire side prepared fried steak dinner with all the fixings.

Just after eating they presented a detailed account of their Farm Aid experience in Minneapolis, Minnesota the September prior where they represented AAM.

We are so proud of this group of young agriculturists. Following their presentation they watched Larry Long, known as AAM’s Troubadour, give a touching performance themed around AAMs early days accompanied by his compilation of pictures, audio and video from more than 40 years ago. 

After a busy couple days in Lubbock we headed northeast for Kansas, making sure to take the scenic route through the Palo Duro canyon.

(I’d like to note we didn’t see a single armadillo which was odd, but we did have two wild hog sightings out on a wheat field south of the canyon and that was a first for me. They are having to deal with these nuisance critters; they do some damage.) We arrived back into White City just in time for the Ambassadors to present at the Willing Workers 4H meeting at 5 p.m.

From our Ambassadors and myself we thank all our board members for their time volunteering — you are unsung heroes!

Thanks to all our members and guest speakers for your continued interest and efforts in farm policy. You drive us to draft resolutions, lobby for change, educate about Ag and provide critical updates on current affairs. AAM is the family farmers organization.