By Jennifer Dorsett
Field Editor

This summer in the small Eastland County community of Carbon, neighbors helped neighbors. Despite being busy with their own crops, area farmers worked together to help their neighbor and friend, Zack Rice, who was in the hospital.

His hay fields were ready to cut, rake and bale.

Rice’s close friend, Brad Stacy, was going to try to harvest Rice’s hay fields on his own. But when Windell Treadway heard about that plan, he said he knew others would be willing to help.

“I had heard that a couple of people were going to go help, but I knew we could get more together than that,” Treadway said. “So, I started calling people at 10 a.m. one morning, and we had 150 acres cut before dark that same evening.”

Treadway, a Texas Farm Bureau member, made 86 calls and connected with 68 different people, all of whom helped in some way.

“I spent basically two days on the phone,” he said. “There were people who pulled out of their own fields to come help and then went back. Brad was going to bale everything, but when people found out Zack was in the hospital, we all wanted to help.”

About 45 farmers helped, according to Treadway. He asked around at the feed store to find out where all of Rice’s fields were located, then tried to coordinate with farmers closest to those fields so no one had to drive their equipment too far.

“There were 36 separate pieces of equipment in the field over a five-day period,” Treadway said. “There was one day where we were running in three separate places, and there were at least 21 pieces of equipment running at the same time. I tried to keep up with who did what the best I could, but I could’ve missed somebody.”

Neighbors helping neighbors is just the way things are done around Eastland County, he said.

“We baled every acre he had,” Treadway said. “This is a tight-knit area. When somebody needs some help, people will help as long as they know about it.”

He downplayed his role in organizing the harvest assistance, saying Brad Stacey deserves a tremendous amount of credit instead.

“The ball was already rolling. I just gave it a nudge. It worked well, because we had so many helpers. No one had to spend a huge amount of time, and we got it all done,” he said. “It took a lot of pressure off Zack in the hospital and took a lot of pressure off Brad, who was going to try to do to it all by himself to help out his friend. Zack’s two sons are working and pulling a lot of the slack, too, but nobody is immune to needing some help on occasion.”

Treadway and other Eastland County farmers are just doing what they always do.

“It’s nice to live in an area where when you need help, people will show up,” he said.