It’s been 50 years since No-Till Farmer launched, and a lot has influenced the practice in those five decades. From equipment and chemical innovations to government influence to cover crops and the soil health movement, many factors have impacted no-till — both good and bad. 

The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

With no-till as a practice having been around for 60 years now, and No-Till Farmer for 50, we wanted to find out if we had readers who have been using the practice consistently for that long. The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

In the late 1950s, Harry Young had been thinking about reducing tillage on his family’s farm at Herndon, Ky. Conventional tillage had been practiced on the family farm since the 1830s.

The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

Horse racing holds its three traditional “Triple Crown” races over a 5-week schedule each May through June. It starts with the Kentucky Derby in Kentucky, moves to the Preakness Stakes in Maryland and wraps up with the Belmont Stakes in New York.

The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

As part of the 25th anniversary of the National No-Tillage Conference, the staff of No-Till Farmer honored 25 active individuals who have made no-till work and grow over the years. The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

The Dust Bowl was an era in the 1930s when the most massive, brutal dust storms ever known to our nation repeatedly ravaged the Panhandle and Great Plains regions.

My father, Harry Young, wasn’t a shy fellow. If he was going to do something, he’d do it out in the open and let the chips fall where they may. The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.

At the time of his presentation to the 2010 National No-Tillage Conference in Des Moines, Iowa, Howard G. Buffett (son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett) had been no-tilling since 1992 on 16,000 acres in Illinois and Nebraska as well as another 6,000-plus acres in South Africa.

When thousands of troops walked around the huge rocks and out of the corn fields on the morning of Sept. 17, 1862, in the bloody Battle of Antietam, little did they know that 19,510 soldiers would be wounded and 3,600 killed on this single, gruesome day. The No-Till History series is made possible by Calmer Corn Heads.