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The farrowing barn was Joe's first investment in a permanent improvement, and it marked the day when, by spending his hard-earned money on capital equipment he could not sell at the market, he began to tie himself to the farm. His decision to drop music was painful, but Joe Moore says firmly, "I don't like to do anything half." So into the scrap heap went his ideas of singing professionally, into the attic went the tenor saxophone his mother had given him, and into the business of farming went Joe Moore.
From the best Angus breeder in his area he bought "Big Boy," the finest animal Joe has ever owned. To fatten Big Boy for showing, Joe fed him three times a day; he washed him every Saturday, groomed his hide with oil and got grandmother Carver to put a good square plait in his tail. Result: at the 1949 International Livestock Exposition in Chicago, Big Boy won 16th place among the nation's best Angus, and Joe, kissing Big Boy's poll, got his picture in the Chicago Tribune.
Bad Luck. Still dissatisfied with the quality of his cattle, Joe worked doggedly to improve his herd. A few months later, Joe and Donald Moore drove over to Winchester, Ky. to look around for more cattle. There Joe spotted a pair of beautiful Angus heifers, "the prettiest things you ever saw." But their owner wanted $500 apiece, and father Donald argued that the price was too high for Joe. Joe reluctantly agreed, spent the rest of the day looking at other cattle. That night Joe took his disappointment back to the hotel. Still discussing the two heifers he had liked, Joe asked his father hopefully: "You reckon it's the thing?" Donald relented. "I reckon if a man wants a thing bad enough," said he, "it's the thing." Joe bought the heifers.
Both heifers had been bred about two months before, but one apparently lost her calf. Later, the other produced a well-formed calf, but it smothered before Joe found it.
"I think the Lord was testing me," says Joe. In any event, his luck soon turned. An Angus cow produced twin heifers and, the next year, one of the Kentucky heifers delivered "as good a bull calf as you ever saw." Thus, mainly from those early purchases, Joe has built up a strong herd of purebred Angus: 26 cows, including six newly bred heifers, two bulls and two nursing calves. Value: about $8,000.
Spiritual Crisis. Until his senior year in high school, Joe paid little attention to girls. When his mother, worried about his lack of social life, urged him to date some of the local belles, Joe would reply: "Oh, I don't want to go out with those old girls and spend all that money." Finally, however, he began dating Ann Huffines. On their first date, says Joe, they "talked about the weather, and I liked the way she talked. I've always knowed there was other girls prettier somewhat than she is, but I found out beauty is only skin deep. I know she'll work with me on the farm—some girls wouldn't—and she might even go out and milk a cow." Will Ann help out with the farm correspondence and book work? Says Joe: "Yes, I figger she'll handle all of it except things about money." In Kansas City last week, Joe and Ann walked hand in hand as they shopped for a diamond ring.