When he was 32 years old, Errol O’Neal (1886-1971) acquired 13 acres of Rockcreek Township farmland for $100 an acre.
But just a few years after that 1918 purchase, the Bartholomew County native and his wife, Lois Opal Crofoot O’Neal (1889-1950), began facing a series of challenges that weren’t uncommon in early 20th century agriculture.
The couple returned from visiting family on Sept. 22, 1920 with their four-year-old daughter, Lois Martha, to find their six-room home engulfed in flames.
While a few valuables such as a piano and a Victrola record player were salvaged, the fire destroyed nearly all of their other possessions and clothing.
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Five years later, in June 1925, several poultry farmers became worried about their own flocks after a mysterious illness later diagnosed as typhoid killed more than 100 of the O’Neals’ chickens.
But despite these and other setbacks, the couple not only survived, but prospered. A founding member of the Bartholomew County Farm Bureau, Errol O’Neal went on to acquire a total of 158 acres of farmland.
But in 1952, two years after losing both his wife and his father, O’Neal retired from farming, remarried and moved to Bargersville. The farm was eventually handed down to his daughter and only child, Lois, who had married W. Gordon “Chris” Reed (1912-1972).
As her husband tended to the family business, Lois Reed (1916-2006) would serve 27 years with the Bartholomew County Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Office, as well as Farm Bureau township director, before retiring in 1982.
Eventually, ownership was handed down to the couple’s three children: Jim Reed, Janet Reed McClintic and Judy Reed Moore. Ownership of what’s now a 140-acre farm, located a half-mile west of the former Shiloh Baptist church off State Road 46 East, remains with the third generation, Jim Reed said.
After his father’s death at the age of 60, Jim Reed assumed control of farm operations for 30 years until his own retirement in 2002.
It was during that time that Reed distinguished himself as Indiana’s Conservation Farmer of the Year in 1984, as well as the recipient of the 1986 Q.G. Noblitt Memorial Award for reforestation and conservation.
Jim Reed also served as a Soil and Water Conservation district supervisor, as well as on the board of directors for the county’s extension office.
But it was in county government, where he first served on the Board of Zoning Appeals, that Reed became well-known outside of agricultural circles.
Selected by Republicans to served out the term of the late Eugene Eckrote, Reed first served on the Bartholomew County Council from 2002 to 2004 and later as an at-large council member from 2012 to 2016.
Reed, who sold off some farmland in Jennings County to buy a larger share of the family homestead from his sisters, said the fields are currently rented to Yancey Murphy.
But along with his wife, Karen, and the couple’s three adult children, Reed emphasized it is his intention to keep the ownership of the farm in their family for as long as possible.
