Reflections on Fifty Years
We recently celebrated 50 years as a post-secondary institution educating Nebraska students and others interested in technical agriculture.
Akin to bringing in the harvest and recording a bin-buster of a crop, the college’s celebration was filled with an abundance of memories and appreciation for those who started building our academic programs back in 1965.
Stan Matzke, now of Lincoln, and Jerry Huntwork of Curtis, served as the college’s first superintendent and assistant. The 50th celebration also brought other faculty and staff from the early years of the University of Nebraska School of Technical Agriculture (UNSTA) back to campus.
They shared stories of compiling an operation on a bare-bones budget with some leftover monies from the high school, which still operated three years simultaneously with the new college on campus.
“We were called a baling wire operation,” recalls Matzke, in his keynote remarks. Resourcefulness was key to establishing the first classrooms, laboratories, and teaching programs for majors in agricultural drafting, surveying and soil science, and agricultural machinery mechanics.
Two students from the original class which started in 1965 and graduated in 1967 joined us along with graduates of 1968, 1969, and 1971, as well of other years and each of the subsequent decades.
We honored Ann Ramm Bruntz, who graduated in 1971 in veterinary technology. She and her husband, David, a ‘71 graduate of production agriculture, have spent their careers contributing to Nebraska agriculture as producers, advocates, UNSTA alumni leaders and supporters of the educational system of the University of Nebraska.
It was my pleasure to present Ann with a bouquet and gifts as special recognition for her decades of outstanding service to NCTA. Ann will be retiring in March from the University of Nebraska Foundation so we took this occasion to salute her significant achievements.
Without leaders such as Ann Bruntz and other alumni, and previous administrators Bill Siminoe, Jerry Sundquist, Don Woodburn and Weldon Sleight, our college would not be the success that it is today.
It’s been my privilege to serve as the most recent custodian of this outstanding institution. We continue to build on the tremendous accomplishments of our predecessors. NCTA remains closely tied to the industries it serves and it continues to offer cutting-edge technology to a growing group of passionate and motivated students.
NCTA’s focus on hands-on, applied education remains as relevant today as it did 50 years ago. NCTA is well poised to enter its next century as a leading college of technical agriculture serving the workforce development needs of an ever growing industry.
I appreciate all who joined us last week to celebrate this milestone in the evolution of our college.
Our upcoming events:
Nov. 19: Country Ball, student dance
Nov. 21-22: Rough Stock Rodeo Clinic, Livestock Teaching Center arena Nov. 25-29: Student holiday for Thanksgiving
Nov. 26-27: NCTA offices closed
Nov. 30: NCTA classes resume