Eminent Farmer/Rancher
County: Potter
Vernon Rausch and the Rausch family own Rausch Hereford Farms, the largest purebred Hereford operation in the United States. He was the first Hereford breeder to host an Internet sale. In the late 1970s, Rausch helped organized Concerned Cattlemen, a group which organized more than 300 beef producers to testify in Washington D.C. and suggested changes to meat import laws. Throughout the years, Rausch has served in leadership positions and on the board of the South Dakota Hereford Association, the American Hereford Association and Certified Hereford Beef. He was a founding member of the South Dakota Beef Breeds Council and traveled with the South Dakota Department of Agriculture on agricultural trade missions to five different countries. In 2007, the South Dakota Hereford Association named Rausch Herefords as Seedstock Producer of the Year.
Rausch is known for his service to South Dakota agriculture and the Hereford industry. He has facilitated the North Central Livestock judging schools for 4-H and FFA members and each year has donated a heifer to a freshman FFA student as part of the Hereford Heifer Grant. He played an active role in the restoration of the Cathedral of the Prairie in the 1980s and more recently helped raise $400,000 to install a slate roof on the Cathedral. Rausch and his wife, Sharon, have four sons and one daughter; Shannon, Trudy Morgan, Dana, Joel and Nick.