Jim Brinkley, Milan, Mo., has been honored to serve on the American Angus Association Board of Directors for the past three years. During this time, he has served on the Finance & Planning, Commercial Programs, Communications & PR, and Member & Affiliate Services committees. Currently, he serves as Chairman of the Commercial Programs committee. He has also served on the boards of the Angus Foundation, Angus Genetics, Inc. (AGI), and as the Association’s representative on the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) live cattle marketing policy committee.

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The Missouri Angus Association unanimously supports and endorses Brinkley for his second term for the American Angus Association Board of Directors.

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Brinkley was born and raised in the Green Hills of northern Missouri near the city of Milan on his family’s farming operation. He graduated high school from Milan in 1979 when he began a joint feeder-cattle venture with his future father-in-law, Hugh Morehead. In 1980, Brinkley married Hugh’s daughter, Sherry, making Milan their lifelong family home.

Brinkley grew up working at his father’s Ford/Case/New Holland machinery dealership in Milan. Shortly after their daughter, Crystal, was born in 1984, Brinkley and his wife purchased 50 head of commercial cows, which quickly grew to more than 200 head. That same year, they purchased their first farm of 220 acres.

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Today, the Brinkley family’s diversified farming operation has grown to more than 1,300 acres and 400 registered Angus cows. In 1987, their son, Justin, was born. Today Crystal and Justin work with their father in the multigeneration family farming operation.

In 1989, Brinkley attended the Missouri Auction School in Kansas City, Mo., following in the footsteps of his father-in-law who was an auctioneer and nationally known partner of the Kansas City Stockyards. After graduation, Jim sold at various locations in northern Missouri, including the Green City Livestock Auction and the Milan Livestock Auction, in addition to many local estate and public auctions in the area.

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Through the years, Brinkley has worked as an order buyer at numerous Missouri livestock markets and represented and purchased many feeder cattle in the green hills of Missouri. As the Brinkley Angus Ranch herd has grown, his time has been focused on marketing feeder cattle for those who purchase bulls from his program.

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The Brinkley family’s evolution into the seedstock industry began in 1992 with the purchase of 30 Charolais cows and the sale of a few Charolais bulls. After observing the growth and expansion of the influence of Angus across the beef industry, Brinkley became a member of the American Angus Association March 29, 1995.

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During their transitional year of 1995, the family sold their Charolais herd and purchased 60 head of Summitcrest Angus cows from the family of the Certified Angus Beef ® (CAB®) brand pioneer Fred Johnson. Having used Summitcrest Angus bulls on his commercial cow herd and working closely with the sales of both feeder and finished cattle, Brinkley recognized Summitcrest as a unique and valuable source of carcass genetics before they were commonly available in the Angus breed.

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That forward thinking established a strong foundation for Brinkley Angus Ranch (BAR).

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In 2000, the family was drawn back to Summitcrest and purchased an entire age group of mature foundation females that had stood the test of time. After this purchase, there was no turning back for Brinkley. Since that time, he has steadily enhanced the genetics of his registered Angus herd through AI and the use of both conventional embryo transfer (ET) and in vitro fertilization (IVF) work.

Brinkley and Sherry hosted their first Angus bull sale March 22, 2003, at Green City Livestock Auction, Green City, Mo., selling 20 Angus bulls. By 2018, that sale had grown to 100 bulls per year at auction and numerous more sold by private treaty. The annual BAR bull sale has become one of the top events of the spring sale season in Missouri.

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With Brinkley’s background in livestock marketing and commercial beef production, he is dedicated to helping customers maximize their return on investment in BAR genetics. Each spring, he helps his customers synchronize and AI their commercial replacement heifers.

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In the fall of 2013, Brinkley was the cornerstone of founding a first-of-its-kind bred heifer sale at Green City Livestock Market. The sale featured bred heifers that met minimum criteria for the GeneMax® genomic testing results, and they were sorted and sold in groups based upon that cutting-edge data.

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Brinkley has hosted Brinkley Angus-influence feeder-calf sales and often places customer cattle into feeding programs where their calves are rewarded for the added value bred into the bulls that sired the calves. Some of the top commercial cattlemen in the Green Hills rely upon Brinkley to provide them with the genetics needed to be profitable. His customers who retain ownership or feed their own cattle have enjoyed exceptional returns from their investment in BAR genetics.

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The Brinkley family farming operation includes more than 1,000 acres of soybeans and corn. Brinkley has three grandchildren 9 years of age and younger.

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In addition to serving as past president of the Missouri Angus Association, Brinkley serves on First Missouri Bank Board of Directors and the University of Missouri Thompson Farms advisory board and is a member of Saint Mary’s Catholic Church in Milan, Mo.

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Jim is honored to serve the diverse membership of the Association and would be humbled to be re-elected to the Board of Directors of the American Angus Association.