Raising Livestock for Fiber

Caitlin Wilson is a gardener, textile artist, and editor who’s become firmly rooted in the Midwest after a childhood in Southern California and Vancouver, Canada. She graduated from the University of Nebraska in 2014 with a degree in English and minors in biology and math, topics that continue to fascinate her and crop up in unexpected ways. She also loves medieval history and is a member of a local recreation group, with which she practices archery, swordsmanship, and more. When she’s at home, she’s often fussing over her beloved English roses or trying to propagate unlikely tropical plants, in between reading voraciously and experimenting with new recipes.

Hank Will (Oscar H. Will III) is a business leader, academic, and agricultural practitioner devoted to conservation and small scale, sustainable agriculture. He’s currently the editorial director at Ogden Publications in Topeka, Kansas, publishers of titles such as Grit, Capper’s Farmer, Mother Earth News, Farm Collector and many other print and digital properties. Hank’s small-scale, high-cash-flow farming experience spans more than four decades, with plant and animal crops as varied as native perennials and heirloom laying chickens. His current project, Prairie Turnip Farm in rural Osage County, Kansas, is home to direct-market Highland beef, landrace lamb, fiber livestock, soap, feral bee, hay, and metal-working businesses. Hank says that none of that would happen without immense help from his wife, Joanna, and her children Scott and Genevieve. Hank has also authored or co-authored 9 books and hundreds of articles, and enjoys maintaining open-pollinated corn varieties his great-grandfather developed in Bismarck, Dakota Territory, under the Oscar H. Will & Co. brand.