Since starting with Farm News back on Jan. 3, 2003, this joyride with Farm News has been fantastic. I remember moving home when my mother became ill and my dad always talking about this little weekly farm paper that he absolutely loved.

That little farm paper ended up re-shaping my life.

Although I have been on the marketing side of things, I am fully aware that we could not do our job properly if the editorial content wasn’t top-notch.

Farm News has been blessed over the years to have many talented editors and writers. Editors from Bill Rentsch, to Randy Mudgett, to Larry “Kersh” Kershner, to Kriss Nelson, to Bill Shea, to now Lori Berglund. Writers like Darcy Dougherty Maulsby to Clayton Rye, Karen Schwaller. Columnists like David Kruse, Jerry Nelson, and Bob Streit.

These are the people who shaped Farm News into the local farm news of choice for so many of our readers.

I’ve gotten to know all of these people who have devoted a large part of their lives and talent to making Farm News what it is today.

I do not want to leave out our publishers in Larry Bushman and Terry Christensen who have led us through good and not so good times. They have helped in the decision making and planning along the way that shaped our look, our design, and our content. I also need to thank our creative services team, our bookkeeping team, and our circulation team that have all had a part of our success.

On the advertising side we have certainly seen a lot of change over the years. I have had the honor of working with many talented salespeople. They end up being more than just employees, they end up being family.

I remember taking over back in 2003 with the mission of firstly getting out of the red and starting to make some profit. Well, with the help of great people we have done some incredible things over last 19 years. People like Jackie Johnson, Mary Sherman, Kristi Elmore, Randy Sells, Christine Johnson, Holly Rokes, and Todd “Woody” Wood. These people all put years of talent, dedication, and work into making Farm News what it is.

Most are now off doing other things but their impact on the relationships they forged with our customers is alive still today. I appreciate all of them for that. There have certainly been others as well that stayed for shorter time, but each made positive impacts to the Farm News legacy.

Over the last 19 years, I have also had the pleasure of meeting many of our readers. Between sitting in our booth for many years at the Iowa Pork Congress, Iowa Power Farming Show, Clay County Fair, and helping produce our Farm News Ag Shows, both in Fort Dodge and Emmetsburg, I got to know a lot of great people. You the reader, have been our life source and all of us at Farm News appreciate you very much.

Lastly, we have our advertisers who have been so very loyal over the years. The relationships that have been built between myself, my staff and our many, many advertisers have been rock solid and have continued to stand the test of time. Many of these people have become very good friends.

Because of things outside of our control (like COVID) we have been forced to make decisions like going twice-monthly. But these changes make us more viable to be able to continue to bring you our local farm news for years to come. I have been blessed to be a large part of our past and our future.

Dana Lantz is the advertising manager of Farm News.