In a press release, John Deere said: "Although John Deere has hired hundreds of employees in the Quad Cities in recent years, the company has consistently stated that each Deere factory balances the size of its production workforce with the needs of the individual factory to optimize the workforce at each facility."

Take a visit with Tyne Morgan, host of "U.S. Farm Report," to Sanborn Field on the University of Missouri–Columbia campus and history comes alive. That's where aureomycin, an antibiotic effective against infections in humans and livestock, originated.

Farmers have learned to live by one of life’s biggest lessons – always expect the unexpected. But sometimes even the unexpected can still cause us to pause and scratch our heads.

Although there’s nothing like getting the grand champion slap in front of a huge crowd in the coliseum, youth livestock exhibitors point out that a lot of hard work and tough lessons were learned behind the scenes first.