Bobby Cupples: Crittenden County Farmer of the Year

Bobby Cupples: Crittenden County Farmer of the Year

He started driving a tractor when he was eight. He worked in Garrott & Sons when he was ten. The patriarch of 2016 Crittenden County Farm Family of the year plowed through his history of farming around Horseshoe. The key word coupled to farming for Bobby Cupples is fun.

“I’ve always farmed,” said Bobby Cupples, “It’s got to be fun.”

Farming is the family way of life for Bobby Cupples now and his forebears too.

“My daddy died in 1993 and he had 33 crops there at our home place,” recalled Cupples. “There used to be a store there and we lived in the back of the store.”

Cotton has always had Bobby’s heart. He remembered earning more responsibilities working his way up through the equipment assignments when he was younger.

“I worked for Garrott’s when I was ten driving a 4020 pulling a six row cultivator and an oil rig on it, going along, doing the cotton like that,” said Cupples grinning with the memory. “I started driving a two row picker, then progressed to a four row picker and I thought that was the best thing that ever hap­pened. But the best thing was getting a boll buggy. Then we upgraded to the six row picker.

His dad helped him nail down his path with one tothe- point question about life on the evening of high school graduation.

“I was going to school. I come to work after school and on weekends. I graduated in ‘78. The night I was graduating my daddy pulled me aside and said I got a question to ask you. I said, yes sir what is that? About school. I said, daddy it don’t make much sense for me wasting my time and you wasting your money with school. He said, I’ll see you in the morning at six. I’ve been there at six ever since. My dad died in July 1993; that’s the day I had to grow up.”

Cupples developed patience and began to appreciate an unwritten rule of the pecking order in getting choice ground to farm. He took advice, watched, waited and wound up with more than 4,000 acres to farm.

“When Garrott’s quit we picked up a little farm. I rented it down here at the lake. At that particular time I was doing all my loans at Sun Trust, with Mr. Rodger Atkins. Over the years I tried to get different pieces of ground. He always told me to wait until a piece of ground comes around-don’t just take any, work your way up as you FAMILY

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Farm Family 2016

see it. So, I always tried to take that advice. I ended up farming 4,200 acres just sitting back, waiting until a good piece of ground came along, and just having good relationships with people in the community.”

Four men work the four thousand acres including Bobby. It’s a lot of acres without a lot of help. While some farmers manage the accounting and marketing from the office; Cupples is a bit alpha dog out on the equipment.

“I’ve always said if this wasn’t fun, I didn’t want to do it; it’s me, my uncle Dennis, my cousin, I got my kin folks,” chuckled Cupples. “Of course, I drive the cotton picker! I drive the cotton planter! I drive the sprayers! I try and let everyone else do something else. It’s a baby-sitting job so I baby sit the cotton. I can tell you every spot in every field.”

Well, he mentioned some of the kin folks. His wife, Marianne teaches in the West Memphis Schools and said as far as farming goes, she simply plays a support role.

“I would be the first to tell you, I don’t do a lot on the farm,” said Marianne. “I make sure he is fed and happy and that is about it. He’ll call on Saturdays, are you home? Can you bring us lunch? Really most of the time they eat from Bonds Grocery, he doesn’t rely on me for much on the farm.”

Cupples took a one-time foray into milo in 2015. He never raised corn or rice. Cotton has always been king of his heart. The farmer of the year confessed to being a lone wolf at heart too.

“I’ve always raised cotton,” Farm Family 2016

said Cupples. “There were three of us working when dad passed. I didn’t like that. So what I did was I dropped back to one farm. It made the job smaller and I did it all by myself. I did every bit of it, drove the picker, in the fall of the year I’d pick up somebody. It’s just developed. Two years ago I had 1,800 acres. Last year I had 227 acres (in cotton). This year I am back up to 1,285. It’s just backand- forth and I work it that way.

“I bought a round bail picker this year, maybe that will make it simpler and easier,” he said.

Cupples is so into cotton he has his beans custom cut so he can stay on top of the cotton, breaking ground in the fall.

Cupples sees a crossroads in the future with a shift in farm labor and had a few other considerations for the future.

“The worst part about farming is the technology has advanced so much that our older guys can’t do and can’t catch on enough to do it and younger ones don’t want to do this. What are you left to do? Do you want to get foreign labor like some do from South Africa? That is a lot to keep up with. Farming is fun but it has its challenges like this.”

“As far as how many more acres I want to farm?” said Cupples. “It’s like this, I was always told as long as you could see the levee, you’d be all right. I’ve got the equipment and the man power with just the four of us to do another 1,000 acres. If it got too much bigger than that it would take the fun out of it. I really don’t want to take the fun out of it.”

Cupples appreciates the relationships that make the farm go. He doesn’t want to begin very aggressive expansion that could stress limits with both a debt load and established working relationships.

“I got good relations with the bank; I do all my business at First National bank of Eastern Arkansas in Marion with Nick Sutton. My chemical business is done at Greenpoint Ag in Hughes. Those are good relations and I don’t want to go to where there’d be pushing and screaming to get it all to work. It’s got to be fun.”

One business relationship vanished when Looney Implement shuttered in Hughes.

“It was a sad day when Mr. Bill closed,” lamented Cupples. “That was no where near fun. John Deere was pushing him to update his computers and equipment, and in my opinion it just wasn’t worth it for him. He’s 92.” I love driving a tractor,” said Cupples. “It’s my hobby. I’ve driven all of them, 720’s and 4020’s all the way up to what we have now. I’m a tractor driver, that’s what I am.”