about us

How We Got Started

My grandfather sparked my interest in registered cattle. He raised registered Angus and Hereford cattle north of Burlington, Colorado. While growing up, my parents had owned a couple of small farms, selling eggs, sheep, nursery trees and a few cattle, but ranching or farming was not my father’s primary occupation. Between my family’s small operations and spending time at my grandfather’s ranch I determined at a very early age this was what I wanted to do.

With the help of one of my uncles and my father, I began showing steers in 4-H and enjoyed that immensely. I tried to learn everything I possibly could about how to identify and improve good cattle. My uncle later introduced me to the late "Master Breeder" Murray Corbin and his Tail N program of Tishomingo, Oklahoma, from whom I purchased a few linebred Emulous heifers. I leased pasture near my parents’ home to run these females. When I left home for college I sold the cows to help pay for tuition but I had made it a major goal in my life to ranch and raise registered Angus cattle again.

My wife, Cathy, shared similar interests to mine. She was raised in Ashland, Nebraska, on a small farm and had a few horses and cattle. She was particularly interested in raising and training quarter horses and spent a great deal of time doing this while growing up. She attended the University of Nebraska and competed on the rodeo team there. Following graduation she taught high school in Hay Springs, Nebraska, and later in North Platte continuing to rodeo during the summers. Later she took an opportunity to work in the computer industry in technical support and sales. This led to her being transferred to Denver, Colorado, where we met and later married. We were blessed with two children, Austin in 1990, and Kate in 1992.

We reentered the cattle business in 1993 when we went back to Tishomingo, Oklahoma, and purchased 15 bred Emulous heifers from Murray Corbins’ son, Bill, in partnership with Herman Schacht of Parker, Colorado. Our partnership was a simple two-thirds/one-third relationship. Herman owned one-third of the cattle and 1,100 acres near where we lived and we owned two-thirds of the cattle. We would split the expenses accordingly and I would be responsible for all the management in return for free pasture for my share of the cattle. With the partnership and moral support from Herman we were able to build our combined cow herd to around 100 head of females. I continued to search for and acquire what I thought were the best Emulous genetics from other previous Emulous linebreeders such as Ankony Angus and the N-Bar Ranch.

We named our program Touchstone Angus because we felt it symbolized this pure strain of Emulous cattle we had begun with. The American Heritage Dictionary defines a touchstone as:
touchstone (tûch´ston´) n. 1. A hard, black stone, such as jasper or basalt, formerly used to test the quality of gold or silver by comparing the streak left on the stone by one of these metals with that of a standard alloy. 2. An excellent quality or example that is used to test the excellence or genuineness of others.

In 1999 we purchased a ranch near Lusk, Wyoming, and later Herman’s share of the cows, enabling us to expand our operation to around 170 registered females. We relocated to the ranch in Lusk in June of 2001.

Our family has been blessed and we are thankful to God for allowing us to live our dreams and raise Angus cattle. To our way of thinking there is no better life.

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