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...lifeblood. But smackdab in the middle of Harrell Ranch, 174 acres have been lost to a big, ugly slab of concrete, compliments of the Texas Department of Transportation. The highway going through the Harrell Ranch, destined to be part of a superhighway called the Trans Texas Corridor, is just one of a new series of highways set to cut across Texas from south to north. The highways and the effect they will have on landowners and on our country are creating quite a fuss.
In 1993, Sam Harrell, with friend and ranch manager Bubba Kay, established Harrell Ranch and then built a whoppingly successful cattle ranch, unique even among Texas' legendary ranches. Harrell Ranch was the only certified organic ranch in the United States that raised Wagyu, a special brand of non-hormone-treated cattle (NHTC) from Japan's Kobe region. Mr. Kay single-handedly bred these cattle to an unsurpassed level of genetic purity, earning the ranch's sterling reputation, and producing the best all-natural Wagyu beef in the country. The enormous investment of time, money, and energy resulted in a superior product commanding a high price, and rewarded the partners with a highly profitable operation, the satisfaction of a job well done, and the sense of balance that comes after wrangling an agreement with the land. Harrell beef was sold to high-end restaurants and organic food stores nationwide and enjoyed an international market. All was fight with the world.
But in 2001, the State of Texas came to call. Sam and Bubba learned a highway was coming, and the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) claimed 174 acres of their ranch for road construction. Through a murky labyrinth of questionable processes and eminent domain, it appropriated prime ranch acreage to build Texas State Highway 130 (SH130), a toll road now bisecting once pristine acres 100 yards from the ranch office.
When we say pristine, we mean it. The land required three years of special treatment to earn the coveted "organic" certification. That certification is tied, not to the cattle raised there, but to the ground. Harrell ranch acreage met the...
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