The Gray Farm near Johnstown was settled by Charles Gray's great-grandparents in 1885. All of the original structures except for a silo were destroyed by a tornado about 1928. Originally raising corn, beets, wheat, barley and pinto beans, the family today produces oats and hay.

In 1880, Nilas Miller began homesteading near Platteville. The original house and brick barn serve as home and garage today for Roland Miller, who raises corn and beans.

County. John W. and Willie Blooding began their dry land farming operation in 1914, with the farm eventually passing to their son Robert, and then to their grandsons, Arthur and Lee. Arthur’s method of farming was listing corn, milo, and wheat, choosing this method because he believed it helped catch any moisture that was available to water the crops. A family corporation, Arthur Blooding & Daughters, now owns the Blooding Farm.

Dennis McCarthy and his children, including daughter Jessie, homesteaded the current Younglund Ranch starting in 1912. Jessie McCarthy married Elmer Younglund in 1914 and they lived on Jessie’s homestead, with the family raising cattle and dry land wheat. Their grandchildren, Ladonna and Monty, and Monty’s wife Sandi, currently own and operate the original homesteaded ranch, running a calf/cow operation. Along with extended family members, five generations of the Younglund family have made their home at the ranch.

Founded in 1918 after a trip searching out homesteading possibilities by two teenage Watkins brothers, the family raised cattle and hogs, and grew potatoes, wheat, and barley. The fourth and fifth generations of the Watkins family currently live and ranch at the Watkins Homeplace, now raising cattle, horses, llamas, chickens, ducks, pigs, cats, dogs, fish, and doves.

W.E. Tetsell Jr., the son of English immigrants, raised sugar beets near Sterling, and purchased his own land in 1922 to expand his operation. His son, Donald Tetsell, took over the farm in 1965, continuing to have wheat, millet, grazing, and Conservation Reserve Program land.  His nephew, Michael, and his wife, Patricia Toft, purchased the land in 1997 and have kept CRP on the land where they enjoy living and watching the flora and fauna.

Marvin Ashby Tappy, known as “Jack,” set out at age 19 to homestead in 1910, and was able to prove up in 1920. He and his wife Effie expanded operations over time, and their granddaughter, Sandi, her husband Monty, and their family still operate and raise cattle on the Tappy Ranch today.

Stone Canyon Company, LLC, is located in Douglas County and has been owned by the Counter-Dammann Family since 1922.  Since the ranch’s purchase by Benjamin Tucker Counter and Daisey Frink Counter, the property has been used primarily for logging and is now part of the “Forest-Agriculture Management” program of the Colorado State Forest Service, whose primary goal is to mitigate forest wildfires, and support bug and disease control.

John Martin Shultz, a son of German immigrants, began farming in Colorado in 1890 and purchased the land that is now Shultz Farm in 1923. His descendants, now in the fifth and sixth generations, still farm the land, raising corn, sugar beets, brewing barley, wheat, and chickens.

The Rocky Mountain Farmers Union was organized in July 1907 by seven charter members in Teller County. In April 1908, the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union came into existence as a state organization aligned with the National Farmers Union. As each decade passed, RMFU members and leaders took on the most pressing challenges of their time from the Great Depression and Dust Bowl to today’s concerns over corporate concentration in agriculture.