Immigrants Lured to Region for Dairy, Cheese Work
Published Sep 16, 2008
Dutch and Danish dairy farmers bring milk and cheese expertise to Texas.
It’s a long way from the Netherlands to The High Ground, and Harry DeWit crossed the Atlantic Ocean and traveled a long road through Canada, California and central Texas to reach it.
DeWit and his wife, Margret, own High Plains Dairy, a successful 4,400-cow operation in Parmer County near Friona.
Significantly, some fellow countrymen have been drawn to West Texas in pursuit of the dairy life.
“There’s a good handful of us Dutchmen,” DeWit says, with just a hint of an accent. “And we have a couple (dairy farmers) from Denmark.”
Local developers would like to see more. “A group of us went to Denmark to meet with some dairy people and talk to them about coming into the region,” says Richard R. “Buzz” David, president and CEO of the Amarillo Economic Development Corp. “We are actively recruiting dairy people from Denmark.”
The Netherlands and Denmark both rank among the top exporters of cheese, so it’s only natural that dairy folks from both countries would recognize that the Panhandle – with its available space, reasonable land prices, favorable climate, established infrastructure and ready feed supply – is ripe for their milk and cheese expertise.
Years ahead of his time, Dutchman Ben Mesman established one of the region’s original dairies, Mesman Dairy Farms Inc. in Farwell. Now in his late 70s, Mesman still makes his cheese the way they did in the old country. And you can’t buy it until he says it’s ready.
Story by Carol Cowan
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