Faces of Farming - Gary McClure

After more than 30 years in the banking business, Gary McClure began a second career pursuing his first passion—farming.

“Began” isn’t really the right word. McClure had been putting together acreage and raising cattle through most of his tenure as a loan officer at Commerce Bank in Lebanon, Mo., but his retirement in 2015 allowed him to focus on the farm full time. 

Well, “focus” isn’t exactly true either. He maintains a pretty busy schedule off the farm, working as an independent insurance agent, serving on the LaClede County Developmental Center board and assisting the LaClede County Election Commission. He’s a longtime member and director of the local MFA affiliate, Farmers Produce Exchange, which is also where he landed his first job.

“I started working at MFA between my junior and senior year in high school loading feed on the dock,” McClure said. “I never had a job I enjoyed any more.”

Since 2023, he’s represented District 13 on MFA Incorporated’s board of directors, a role he’s embraced with similar enthusiasm.

 “I’ve always had deep respect for MFA Incorporated and its leaders, and I’m honored to be part of it,” McClure said. “I’m enjoying the meetings, the camaraderie and seeing what goes on there. I really do love it.”

McClure and his wife of 41 years, Karen, have a son, Kyle, who manages a neighboring farming operation, and a daughter, Krenda Wade, who teaches English and coaches cross-country track at Lebanon Middle School. She and her husband, Dusty, have a 4-year-old daughter, Karis, and another child on the way.

McClure spoke with Today’s Farmer in mid-September, just as fall calves were arriving on his picturesque farm.

What inspired your passion for farming? 
Growing up, I always had tremendous respect for farmers. Everybody I idolized, everybody I loved, were farmers. And agriculture just always fascinated me. The question of, “What are you going to do with your life?” was never any debate in my mind. Farming was the ultimate goal. It wasn’t necessarily a dream. It was just an expectation.

Why is being  a co-op leader so important to you? 
I love people. That’s my main motivation. I love rubbing shoulders with people I respect. I’ve been actively involved with the Farmers Produce board here for a long time, and that’s primarily why I wanted to be part of the MFA Incorporated board. They’re both tied together in so many ways. Farmers Produce depends on MFA Incorporated for products, payroll, accounting, customer support, technology and so on. Without that support, things would be a lot different for our local MFA. Being on the corporate board not only gives me the chance to hear what’s happening firsthand but also share our perspective from the local level. At the end of the day, my heart’s in the right place, because we all want the same thing—for MFA to survive. It’s personal to me, on so many levels.

What do you think are the biggest challenges to that survival?
We have to figure out the labor issue. Finding people who want to work and stick with a job is getting more and more difficult. So is the cost to build new infrastructure and buy equipment. It boils down to the fact that we’re going to have to look at things differently, but, as human beings, it’s hard to change. We want today to be like yesterday and tomorrow to be like today, but we can’t keep doing the same things and expect different results.

What have you learned about MFA Incorporated that you might not have known without the closer involvement?
I’ve learned that this is a big ship to sail with lots of different winds blowing it. And I didn’t really comprehend the impact of different types of farm economies on MFA than what I had experienced. There’s a different type of support needed for farmers in northern Missouri than I’m used to in southern Missouri, and we have to serve them both. MFA was formed by a group of men who needed to buy inputs collectively for a better price and to help themselves. That’s what MFA is still all about, which means it’s about all of us working together.

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