Concho Hereford Association
Averages $1430 At Fiftieth

SAN ANGELO — Celebrating a half-century of Hereford bull sales here, the Concho Hereford Association Monday averaged $1430 per head on an offering of 55 head.

The high selling bull, consigned by Frank Price, Sterling City, sold to W&W Foster Ranch, Sterling, for $2800. The champion bull of the combined show and sale was consigned by the Rocking Chair Ranch, Fort McKavett, and sold to Martin Reed, Sterling City, for $500.

In addition, two bulls brought $2150 each; one was consigned by Pied Piper Farms, Hamlin, and sold to Glen Brandt, Bellville, the other from the Rocking Chair to the W.T. Waggoner Estate, Vernon.

Volume buyers include W&W Foster Ranch, Sterling City, four head for $7000; Lazy Y Ranch, six bulls for $6500; Martin Reed, three for $5900; and Holmes Ranch, three for $5500.

Founded in 1947 by a group of area Hereford men, the Concho Hereford Assn. was initially limited in membership to breeders wthin a 100 mile radius of San Angelo.

The San Angelo Stock Show Association at the time hosted a Hereford show and sale, and the Concho Hereford Assn. was formed to sponsor it. Early sales offered both bulls and females, but in 1952 the group discontinued the female segment, concentrating on bulls.

For decades, the association sent an individual to participating ranches around the first of August to select sale bulls, a tradition that evolved into the "Concho Hereford bull tour." That eventual proved too costly, so bulls today are screened at the sale facility on Saturday before the annual Monday sale.

Another longstanding tradition that recently bowed to economic pressures was the practice of selling bulls at halter in show trim. In 1994, the association moved the sale from its decades-old home at the San Angelo Fairgrounds to Producers Livestock Auction, where bulls go through the auction ring in their working clothes.

The group’s connection with Producers Auction started years before, however; the Concho Hereford Assn. in the 1950s began sponsoring monthly feeder calf sales which continue to this day, co-sponsored by the Texas Angus and West Central Texas Angus associations.