Creeping across the pasture land. Got dirt on
the boots and a working hand. From the milk house
home to the auction call. These are the folks
standing strong and tall. Yeah, this is... Welcome
back to the Bullvine Podcast, where we cut through
dairy industry noise to get you the insights
that actually matter. You do indeed. And today
we're doing something a bit special. We are.
We're diving deep into the story of Charlie Will.
I mean, the guy Select Sires rejected back in
1974, who just just now won the industry's highest
honor, the NAAB Pioneer Award for 2025. I read
this article. I actually had to check twice that
this was real. It's just. Wow. It is real. And
here's the kicker for everyone listening. His
bulls, they haven't just influenced pedigrees.
They've basically shaped almost every Holstein
pedigree on the planet. Yeah, no kidding. We're
talking Black Star, Oman, Durham. These are names
every single dairy farmer knows. legendary stuff
it's the ultimate i told you so really a genetic
empire built by the guy they said wasn't good
enough exactly so our mission today is to really
unpack the sources we've got the full profile
the history even some internal company records
apparently detailing how one rejection letter
just one no thanks somehow led to the biggest
genetic revolution the dairy industry has ever
seen How did he do it? How do you sneak in the
back door, survive, what was it, a decade of
being watched, and then just completely change
how we breed cows? That's the story. Hashtag
tag, tag, tag. I rejection that launched a revolution.
The backdoor strategy. Okay, let's set the scene.
It's spring, 1974. Charlie Will, he's just graduated
from the University of Illinois Dairy Science
degree in hand. He's ready to go. Yeah, eager.
Full of ideas, probably. Absolutely. And think
about the time, right? Nixon's dealing with Watergate
gas is maybe 55 cents a gallon. Yeah. It's a
different world. And the AI industry. Yeah. Dominated
by just a few big players. Right. And he didn't
just apply to select sires. The sources are clear.
He sent resumes to every major AI stud in North
America. He put himself out there everywhere.
And the response from select sires, the biggest
one, a flat thanks, but no thanks. No openings
in the sire department. A form letter, basically.
Can you imagine getting that? From everyone.
Every single place he tried slammed the door.
Not one opening, apparently, for this bright
kid who'd focused his whole education on this
exact thing. It really says something, doesn't
it? About maybe how closed off the industry could
be back then. Perhaps looking for, I don't know,
certain connections or just sticking to what
they knew. Well, and what gets me is his background.
This wasn't just some academic, right? He grew
up on a commercial Holstein farm. Southern Illinois.
Twice a day milkings. He knew cattle the old
school way. He lived it. He knew the smell of
the barn, the feel of it, knew what silage and
sawdust and manure actually meant for managing
cows. That's crucial for a sire analyst, isn't
it? You need that practical grounding. You absolutely
do. It's not just numbers on a page. He understood
what a cow actually needed to function day to
day. And he had the academic chops, too. He studied
genetics at Walkway Farms, even made the U of
I dairy judging team, which is, you know, pretty
competitive. He had the eye and the book smarts.
He had both, but still, nothing. Just another
resume in the pile. It's kind of painful, really.
Makes you wonder how much talent gets missed
when companies are too rigid, you know. Sticking
to the same old hiring boxes. Oh, for sure. Most
people facing that wall of no would have just
pivoted. gone into feed sales maybe, or taken
a different path entirely. Charlie Will could
have just been a footnote. But he didn't. This
is where it gets clever. He starts scanning the
classifies in Hordes Derriman, you know, the
tiny print in the back. Yeah, the ones you almost
need a magnifying glass for. Exactly. And he
spots this little ad, a sales rep job. MABC,
Michigan Animal Breeders Cooperative. It was
a select sires member co -op out in western Indiana.
So not the dream sire department job, not even
quite. But it was connected, a foot in the door.
And critically, it put him right there on the
front lines, talking to farmers day in, day out.
He didn't waste it. Two years grinding it out
as a sales rep. Yeah. Learning what farmers were
really dealing with. And then MABC moves him.
Up to Wisconsin, Green Bay area, real dairy country,
tough conditions, tough farmers. That's a proving
ground. For sure. And his job wasn't just sales
anymore. He was opening new territory and he
was an SMS evaluator. Okay, let's break that
down. SMS sire meeting service. What does that
actually mean for him day to day? It means he's
not in an office. He's out there farm to farm,
physically measuring cows, looking at their traits,
you know, stature, strength, utter depth, feet
and legs, all of it. And then deciding which
select sire's bull would be the best fit to improve
that specific cow's weaknesses. Precisely. So
he's not just pushing semen, he's doing applied
genetics. Hundreds of times, on hundreds of farms.
He's building this massive practical database
in his head about what actually works in the
real world. Way beyond what any analyst stuck
behind a desk could learn. He's building relationships
too, building a reputation. In Wisconsin, no
less. You earn respect there. You definitely
do. So after four years of that four years proving
himself in the trenches, Ward finally gets back
to the main office in Plain City, Ohio. A sire
analyst job opens up. 1978. And this time he
gets it. But Jake, listen to this. The guy who
hired him, Dick Chester, apparently called hiring
Charlie a risk. A risk after four years in the
system proving himself. Wow. Yeah. The rejected
kid, the one who came in the side door, he had
to grind for four years just to get the job they
initially denied him. He was finally inside HQ,
but, well, the fight wasn't over. Not by a long
shot. He basically snuck in, like you said, and
was maybe on track to be a legend. But, yeah,
sounds like management was still keeping a very
close eye on him. Hashtag, hashtag two, the 10
-year probation and the Black Star breakthrough.
Okay, so he's in. And his initial success, pretty
much immediate. His very first pick as an analyst
was walkway chief Market. He knew the walkway
herd from his hometown network. Right, leveraging
those connections he built. Exactly. And Mark
worked. Good daughters, but maybe more importantly,
really exceptional brood cows, the kind that
build cow families. He clearly had the eye. And
he was smart. He didn't just rely on his own
knowledge. He soaked things up from the veterans
there. Guys like Ron Long Charlie call him one
of the greatest cowmen he ever met. And George
Miller, the marketing director. Ah, George Miller.
His philosophy seems key here. What was it again?
It was simple, but powerful. Genetics isn't about
looking pretty in a catalog. It's about solving
problems for farmers, period. That's it. That
focus on the customer, the guy milking the cows,
that seems to become Charlie's guiding principle
for everything that followed. It should be taped
to every breeder's wall, honestly. Absolutely.
Solve the farmer's problem first. You see this
early success with Mark. You see him learning
from the best, absorbing this customer first
philosophy. You'd think, OK, he's made it. He's
fully accepted now. You would think. And yet.
Yeah. This is where the story just floors me.
You mentioned it earlier, but the internal records,
they show something else entirely. Yeah. This
is the bombshell part I had to read like three
times in the profile. After hiring him in 1978,
they put Charlie Will on probation. For 10 years.
Stop right there. Do you just say 10 years? A
full decade? Years. You're telling me after he
got in, after four years proving himself in the
field, after making a great first pick with their
mark, they still didn't trust him. What was that
about? Was that normal back then or was this
personal? Specific to him. It sounds like institutional
resistance, maybe caution. I don't know if it
was personal, but it was definitely about him
being the backdoor hire. 10 years is just. It's
an eternity in any job, right? Especially in
sire selection where one bad bet can cost millions.
They were watching him every move for a decade.
Waiting to see if he was for real. If that early
success was just luck. Pretty much. Could he
deliver consistently? Could he handle the pressure
long term? They needed proof. Apparently a lot
of proof. The pressure must have been unbelievable.
Every single bull he picked. For 10 years. Knowing
that if it failed, it could confirm all their
doubts, justify that initial rejection. Wow.
It makes the breakthrough when it finally came
even more incredible. So fast forward, spring
1988. Ten years into this probation, this is
the moment. Picture the scene, right? The genetics
department in Plain City. Everyone huddled around
those old dot matrix printers. Remember those
things? Loud, clunky. Oh, yeah, like angry typewriters
hammering out the future. They're waiting for
the new proofs. And there's one bull everyone's
watching, the one Charlie really went to bat
for. Tumar Blackstar. This was make or break.
If Blackstar bombed after ten years, well, the
risk they took on him would look like a failure.
But Blackstar didn't bomb. He didn't just succeed.
He absolutely exploded. The numbers came out
and bam, instantly at the top. Domestic proofs,
international proofs. He was the bull. The king.
And what's really interesting is what kind of
bull he was. He wasn't necessarily fitting the
mold of what was trendy then, was he? Not at
all. In the late 80s, there was still this push
for taller, sharper, more dairy cows. You know,
the skyscraper cows that looked amazing walking
across the tan bark. But maybe he didn't hold
up so well in the freestalls. Exactly. Black
Star was kind of the opposite. He wasn't extreme.
He was built like a tank, a freight train. Wide
chest, deep body, powerful legs, just screaming
strength and durability. Functional strength.
The kind that keeps cows in the herd paying the
bills. Deep chest for heart and lungs. Strong
legs to carry a heavy udder. Stuff farmers actually
needed. That's it. And the industry recognized
it instantly. Every AI stud everywhere suddenly
wanted Black Star Sons. He didn't just hit. He
reset the standard for what a profitable, reliable
bull looked like. And that was finally enough.
After 10 years. Apparently so. The story goes,
at the very next Kroof meeting, Dick Chichester
stands up. He presents a letter. Signed by the
entire Sire team. What does it say? Simple. Charlie
Will was officially off probation. Ten years.
Think about that. A full decade of proving yourself
day in, day out, under that kind of scrutiny.
Finally getting that official nod after delivering
a global sensation. It's incredible persistence,
but it also makes you wonder, like you said earlier,
how many other potential game changers get weeded
out by that kind of skepticism, that focus on
pedigree or credentials over actual results.
Hashtag, hashtag three, the philosophy of finding
diamonds, the Elton principle. So Blackstar gives
him the credibility, the clout, maybe even the
freedom to really double down on his own philosophy,
which wasn't about following the crowd. No, quite
the opposite. After Blackstar hit big, he could
have played it safe. Just chase the next high
index, Sunray. But he deliberately started looking
where others weren't, looking for those hidden
gems the rest of the industry had overlooked
or dismissed. Which brings us to what the sources
call the Elton Principle. This is maybe the most
practical takeaway for anyone selecting genetics
today. It centers around one bull, 7H2236 Amprise
Bell Elton. Right. And Elton, on paper, had a
huge red flag, especially by today's standards.
His dam, she only classified good plus. And her
udder. Just good. Okay, pause there. Today, in
2025, with everyone chasing EX -95 scores and
fancy pedigrees, a bull from a good -plus dam...
with a good utter. Forget about it. Most selection
committees wouldn't even look at the file. He'd
be screened out automatically. The focus on high
classification, that catalog dream, it just blinds
people sometimes. But Charlie knew classification
was just one piece. It wasn't the whole story.
He believed in doing the actual legwork. He did.
Instead of just trusting the score sheet, he
decided he had to see Elton's daughters himself,
in the flesh. So he gets in the car, drives all
the way up to Minnesota. In February. Which,
you know, is not exactly prime time for a road
trip up there. No kidding. Bitter cold. But he
goes into the barn. Imagine that freezing outside.
Then you step into that warm, humid barn air.
Steam coming off the cows. The sounds of the
milkers. That's the real world of Derry. Far
from the glossy photos in the bowl catalogs.
Totally. And he starts looking at Elton's daughters.
And what does he find? Not what the good udder
score might suggest. He sees exceptional udders.
Deep cleft, that strong center support, rear
udders high and wide, and maybe most importantly,
feet and legs built for the long haul. Built
for longevity. Cows built to last. Not just look
good for one picture or one lactation. Cows that
could handle multiple lactations on concrete
without breaking down. Exactly. Functional durability.
He looked past the piece of paper and saw what
mattered in the barn. That's the Elton principle
in action. And the impact of that cold trip to
Minnesota. Yikes. It's just staggering. Elton
goes on to sire Durham. And Durham. He sired,
what was the number? Get this. 5 ,039. 5 ,039
documented excellent daughters. From a bull whose
own sire came from a good -plus dam. It's unbelievable.
A dynasty built from genetics others rejected
based on one score. And it doesn't stop there.
Elton also became the maternal grandsire of Oman,
Obie Manfred Justice Oman, arguably the most
influential bull of the last 20 years. All traced
back to Charlie trusting his eye in that Minnesota
barn over the classification sheet. It comes
right back to that George Miller philosophy,
doesn't it? Solving barn problems, not chasing
catalog dreams. Absolutely. The industry pushes
extreme type, extreme production indexes. But
Charlie's big hits, the bulls that sold millions
of units, they sold because they fixed real everyday
problems for farmers. Omen is the perfect example.
Over a million units sold. Why? Because Charlie
and the team selected him to tackle the big issues
that were killing profitability back then. Fertility
problems, cows not lasting, high vet bills. Oh
man, delivered. He wasn't just about milk, though
he had that too. He brought better daughter pregnancy
rate, DPR, longer productive life, PL, easier
calving, lower thematic cell score, health traits,
efficiency traits, the stuff that makes a farmer's
life easier and saves money. Right. He directly
improved net merit by hitting those health and
fertility components. When a bull makes your
daily chores easier, makes your cows last longer,
and cuts your vet bills. Farmers notice, they
buy that semen. Doesn't matter if he wasn't the
fanciest type bull out there. The sales numbers
prove it. You listed them before, but they bear
repeating. Ullman, Matthey, all over a million
units. Integrity, 1 .5 million. Blitzee, the
select SIRES record holder, over 1 .52 million
units. That's volume driven by results, not hype.
Pure farmer demand because the bulls worked.
And Charlie wasn't just finding these bulls,
he was explaining why they worked. He traveled
everywhere, 49 states, 18 countries, translating
complex genetics into practical terms. Yeah,
that story about his Wisconsin seminar sums it
up. Standing in front of 200 farmers, taking
something like a plus 2 .0 score for utter depth,
which sounds abstract. And making it real, saying,
look, this means his daughters are likely to
milk two full lactations longer for you. That
connects. That's value. Someone, Scott Ruby,
I think, said he had an incredible gift for making
the complex understandable. He basically democratized
genetics, made it accessible, practical for everyone.
OK, so he's built this incredible career based
on traditional evaluation, seeing cows, trusting
his eye, understanding functional traits, the
Elton principle, right? You'd think when the
next huge disruption comes along, he might be
the one to resist it. You absolutely would. And
that disruption was genomics. Hits the scene
around 2008. It completely flipped the script
on decades of bull evaluation. Think about it.
Charlie is approaching 60 by this point. He's
mastered the old system, the progeny test system.
Breed a bull, wait five years for daughters to
milk, then you know if he's any good. Slow, expensive,
but reliable eventually. And most guys his age,
especially the successful cowmen who relied on
their eye, were skeptical. The sources say a
lot of the old -timers just didn't buy it. How
could a DNA test replace five years of real -world
performance data? They were comfortable with
what they knew. They built careers on it. Why
change now, especially with something that seemed
like, I don't know, science fiction almost? But
Charlie! Instead of digging in his heels, he
saw genomics for what it was. An incredible new
tool. He recognized its potential immediately.
What was the key difference he saw? Reliability.
Yeah, reliability and speed. Before genomics,
he said, using parent averages to predict a young
bull's potential was maybe a 50 -50 shot. You
were basically guessing on half your selections.
A very expensive guess, considering the cost
of raising and housing all those young bulls
for years. Exactly. Genomics changed the odds
dramatically. Suddenly, you could test a calf
and get a reliability of, say, 70 -75 % for key
traits almost instantly. Way better odds than
50 -50. That's a game changer for managing risk
and accelerating progress. You can identify the
elite calves much, much earlier. Think about
the business side for a farmer -owned co -op
like Select Sires. The old way meant housing
hundreds of bulls for five years, knowing maybe
half would fail. Millions spent on feed and care
for bulls that wouldn't make it. Genomics let
them cut that drastically. Identify the likely
winners early, manage inventory, turn bulls over
faster. Huge cost savings. But Charlie's thinking
went beyond just adopting the tech. He saw the
potential downside too, right? The risk to the
breed itself. That's where he really showed his
foresight, acting as a steward of the breed.
He realized immediately, if everyone just chases
the very highest genomic young bulls based on
these new indexes, you end up breeding everything
to the same. few sires or sire lines. Precisely.
The genetic pool shrinks dangerously fast. You
increase inbreeding, you lose diversity, you
potentially concentrate recessive genes. It's
a huge long -term risk. And we're seeing the
effects of that now, aren't we? Concerns about
Holstein inbreeding levels hitting potentially
critical points in some elite populations. We
are, and Charlie saw it coming. So even though
it might have cost select sires some points on
the ranking list in the short term, not always
having the absolute number one genomic bull,
He guided them to deliberately use some bulls
with maybe slightly lower indexes, but different
pedigrees. Outcross bulls. To maintain that genetic
diversity. Yeah. Even if it wasn't the most immediately
profitable or popular move. He literally asked,
if we don't maintain genetic diversity, who will?
That's thinking about the future health of the
entire breed, not just the next proof run. Sacrificing
a little now for long -term stability. And the
overall economic impact of genomics, the tool
he championed. It's massive. The numbers are
staggering. Estimates suggest that between 2008
and 2019 alone, genomics added something like
$50 per cow per year in genetic value across
the U .S. herd. $50 per cow per year times millions
of cows. It adds up. We're talking a $4 billion
total industry impact just from the genetic gain
enabled by genomics in that period. Maybe more.
And now, over a million genomic tests run every
year. It's completely transformed how we select
bulls and heifers. It has. And it's thanks in
large part to leaders like Charlie, who, even
late in their careers, weren't afraid to embrace
disruption. He didn't fight the future. He helped
shape it. Pivoting like that at age 60, that
takes real vision. Hashtag, tag, tag, V or S.
Practical application for today's dairy farmer,
October 2025 reality. Okay, so let's tie all
this history and philosophy directly to what
you, the listener, are facing right now. It's
October 2025. The market's tough. CME milk is
maybe, what, $17 .19? Somewhere tight like that.
Yeah, margins are squeezed. Input costs are high.
You've got external stuff going on, too. Maybe
a government shutdown, messing with USDA reports,
global companies making big moves like Nestle,
backing away from methane initiatives. Lots of
uncertainty. Exactly. It's a high -pressure environment.
And that's precisely why Charlie Will's focus
on practicality practical, functional, efficient
genetics is more relevant today than ever. But
there are bright spots too, right? Things built
on the foundation he helped lay. For sure. Despite
the pressure, most farmers, maybe 75%, still
expect to turn a profit this year. We've got
billions, like $8 billion in new dairy processing
capacity coming online. And the beef on dairy
trend. That's huge, providing a really vital
secondary income stream for many operations.
And the cows themselves are just getting better
and better faster than ever. That April 2025
base change proves it. It really does. The biggest
base change ever for Holsteins. Rolling back
butterfat by 45 pounds, protein by 30 pounds.
And just to clarify for everyone listening that
base change doesn't mean cows got worse. It means
the average cow improved so much so quickly that
they had to reset the zero point just to keep
the index numbers meaningful. Right. It's mathematical
proof of rapid genetic progress. Today's average
Holstein, the kind Charlie championed, more moderate
size, healthier, more fertile, is way more efficient
than those skyscraper cows from the 80s. They're
doing more with less. So Charlie distilled his
approach down to three core principles. What
were they again? Kind of a survival guide for
today. Yeah, simple but critical. One, find the
right people. Work with advisors, selectors,
evaluators who actually understand farming, who
have that barn eye, who know genetics is about
improving your bottom line. Do. Work as a team.
Remember that for co -ops like Select Sires,
it's farmer -owned. Decisions impact everyone.
Choose genetics that benefit the whole system,
the long -term health of the breed. And three.
Embrace new tools. Don't be afraid of technology.
Use genomics. Use IVF. Use sex semen. Whatever
helps you make faster, smarter genetic progress
on your farm. Okay, so armed with those principles,
let's say I'm sitting down next week looking
at bull proofs, trying to make decisions for
my herd. What are the three concrete lessons
from Charlie's career I should apply? Number
one has to be the Elton principle. Look where
others aren't looking. Don't just chase the highest
TPI or net merit number. Dig deeper. Look at
functional traits. Is there a bull with maybe
slightly lower index, but his daughters have
incredible longevity? Or fantastic feet and legs?
Don't automatically reject a bull because his
dam wasn't EX95. Look for functional durability
that solves your herd -specific problems. Okay,
look beyond the obvious index. What's number
two? Number two is Omen's lesson. Select bulls
that solve real day -to -day barn problems, not
just ones that look good on paper or in the show
ring. Omen sold millions because he improved
calving ease, fertility, health, the things that
cost farmers time and money every single day.
Prioritize those net merit component traits.
Productive life, DPR, somatic cell score, livability,
these directly impact your profitability. Got
it. Solve real problems. Yeah. And the third
lesson. The third is the genomics lesson. Embrace
disruption and use the best tools available no
matter how long you've been farming. Use genomic
testing on your heifers. It's affordable now
to make smarter culling decisions early. Consider
IVF to multiply genetics from your very best
cows faster. In this tight market, the speed
of genetic progress you can achieve using these
tools is crucial. It's not a luxury. It's essential
risk management. Knowing which heifers are keepers
within weeks instead of years. That's a massive
advantage. That acceleration is really Charlie
Will's gift to today's dairy farmer. Hashtag,
tag, tag, tag, T6. Legacy and final takeaway.
So you walk into pretty much any barn today.
You see those Holsteins, efficient, moderate
size, working hard. That's Charlie Will's legacy
right there in front of you. Those cows, their
resilience, their fertility, their ability to
last. So much of that traces back to the bulls
he found. The philosophy he championed. It's
a $4 billion legacy measured in genetic gain,
but it's also measured in cows that just work
better for the farmer. The story itself is just,
it's incredible. From total rejection to industry
pioneer, it's pure persistence. That farm kid
they wouldn't hire waits 10 years just to get
off probation, then spends the next 30 years
completely changing global dairy genetics, focusing
on the farmer, trusting his eye, embracing the
future. It's a powerful lesson. especially for
young people maybe struggling to get a foothold
in the industry right now. That rejection letter,
it wasn't the end. It was the start of the backdoor
strategy. Your first job might not be the dream
job, but use it. Learn from it. Build your reputation
like Charlie did out there in those Wisconsin
barns doing SMS evaluations. Earn your shot.
He proved that sometimes the path to the top
isn't the front door. It's the side door, followed
by a whole lot of hard work and proving people
wrong. That 2025 NAAB Pioneer Award, that's the
official recognition absolutely deserved, but
the real lasting impact. It's the efficiency
built into the modern Holstein herd. That $4
billion in added value. That's what helps farmers
weather the storms like the tight market we're
seeing right now. You know, this might be one
of the most important stories we've covered here.
A rejection that sparked a revolution, manifitting
literally every single dairy farmer listening
today. Absolutely. And it's not just a history
lesson. His methods, his principles, they're
the roadmap for navigating today's challenges,
for making smart choices in a tough market. Definitely.
So head over to www .thebullvine .com. You can
read the full in -depth profile on Charlie Will
there. We've also linked some really practical
articles that build on these ideas, how to actually
apply selection indexes effectively, making the
most of the beef on dairy strategy using these
efficient cows, and a crucial look at Holstein
inbreeding that issue Charlie was so concerned
about. All the tools you need to put these lessons
into practice. Subscribe, keep learning, and
make sure you join us next time for more insights
you can trust right here on the Bullbine Podcast.