Sully County farmer Maynard Klingbeil’s relentless passion for the land and the bounty he drew from it now promises one more extraordinary harvest—even after his death.
The wiry bachelor farmer respected by all for his unbending faith and incredible work ethic didn’t let his transition to eternity Feb. 27, 2020, end his love for nurturing the soil, conserving the land and improving yields for generations to come.
In a profound and enduring act, Klingbeil gifted all 2,683 acres of his farm east of Onida to the South Dakota State University Foundation after his death at age 84. He did that, despite the fact he never attended SDSU. Never went to a sporting event there. In fact, never even likely set foot on campus.
But Klingbeil and the land-grant university were not strangers. Through years of working with SDSU Extension, the school’s agricultural research efforts, the farmer’s connection to the university turned his little patch of prairie into a prosperous and environmentally sustainable venture.
Little patch? His farm was appraised conservatively at $6.7 million.
It sold for almost $17 million—a gift that represents one of the largest and most impactful philanthropic commitments in SDSU’s 141-year history.
It will all support agriculture in this state and beyond.
“Maynard was a great example of a guy who built up wealth by working his tail off, keeping his head down and living a modest life,” says Mike Barber ‘97, the former development director for SDSU’s College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences who connected with Klingbeil late in his life. “The end result of all that is, he’s going to make a huge difference (at SDSU) for a long, long time. It’s a beautiful story.”
Actually, two beautiful stories, says SDSU President Barry Dunn. First is a tale about impact. What Klingbeil’s generosity provides the university is a major flow of resources into the emerging field of precision agriculture that will benefit students and educators.
The money means annual scholarships of $10,000 each that can be renewed for four years, Dunn says. Sixteen are being awarded this fall, many of them to young men and women who SDSU might otherwise lose to Big 10 or Big 12 schools, the president says.
Klingbeil’s gift also endowed three new leadership positions in the areas of agronomy, plant science and precision agriculture. The endowments represent stature along with financial resources.
“With endowed positions, leadership is critical,” Dunn says. “This gift will enable us to attract a different pool of candidates, people who would have gone elsewhere in the past. Certainly, we have good and talented people now. But with this endowed position, whoever we choose will be a different leader than we would have gotten without this endowed position. And that person will hire different people, creative people, as well.”
SDSU understands how that process works, Dunn says. The university has seen it play out with its land-grant peers. With Klingbeil’s gift, SDSU is now approaching its goal of commitments for 50 endowed positions it established for its comprehensive campaign, Bold & Blue: The Campaign for South Dakota State University. The campaign announced a goal last fall to raise $500 million.
The other fascinating story in all this features the farmer from Sully County and the faith, values and personality that defined him.
Klingbeil led a simple, unpretentious life, according to those who knew him. It began May 24, 1935, and ended 84 years later on the same farm 5½ miles east of Onida. His only sibling, Doris, died before him and left behind no children.
Klingbeil never married and never strayed far. In his entire adult life, word has it he never slept anywhere but in his own house except for two or three nights. His home was not expansive, maybe 1,200 square feet. And though tidy and neat, it looked like something right out of America’s post-World War II past, friends say.
“You stepped back in time when you were there,” says Emily Sovell ’98 of Onida, who did Klingbeil’s estate administration after he died. “He was just very conservative. There were no frills, nothing fancy in his home. I would venture to say there was not an upgrade in anything by way of convenience or appliance for decades.”
Klingbeil lived the way his parents did and no different, says Darren Larson, a certified public accountant and trustee for the farmer’s trust. For example, though he could have hooked up to rural water for $40 a month, Klingbeil never did, satisfied with the well water the family had always relied on, Larson says.
Cattle once grazed on the Klingbeil pastures, but that had been decades ago, and for the most part he focused in later years on small grains—winter wheat, spring wheat, some corn and sunflowers. He also raised chickens for more than half his life. “That was always fascinating to me,” Larson said. “He certainly didn’t need the income, but he delivered eggs all over town and the area. Must have liked doing it. If he got paid, it was just basically covering the cost.”
Klingbeil planted and trucked his crops, relying on custom combining and commercial sprayers to do the rest. His days were long, the labor arduous. Though a small man, “his hands were like vise grips,” Barber says. “They were strong, big, heavy hands.”
Klingbeil was a man of considerable spiritual strength, as well. For 45 years, he served as secretary/treasurer of the Sunday school at Onida United Methodist Church. He never missed a day of church, Larson says. “Even if he had to get wheat out of the ground before a hail storm,” Larson says, “he wasn’t going to miss church for that.”
For all his old-fashioned ways—whether fixing equipment himself or relying on his free-standing wood stove to heat the house—Klingbeil had a progressive side.
During 50 years on the Sully County Crop and Livestock Improvement Association, and as an Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service committeeman in Sully County, he was always looking for ways to improve, friends say. That’s why he let SDSU plant research plots on his land.
Klingbeil didn’t shun the newest in farm equipment, either. “His equipment was upgraded,” Sovell says, “even when his personal living was not.”
Despite the lack of a college education, Klingbeil was a lifelong learner. He embraced technologies in no-till farming developed by Dwayne Beck Ph.D. ’83 at the Dakota Lakes Research Farm south of Pierre. He was a conservationist who adapted well to present technologies in soil health and reducing erosion.
“He was very much involved in SDSU, not through the academic side of the house, but through our Extension specialists and research,” Dunn says.
People didn’t know about those connections because Klingbeil didn’t broadcast them. That wasn’t his style in farming or in life. For example, his largesse wasn’t directed just to SDSU. Though there was a public announcement about a substantial gift he made to the Crazy Horse Memorial, no one ever heard about the donations to fight cancer or the community needs he met in Onida, Larson says.
That said, everyone in Onida appreciated and respected him, Sovell says. Now that appreciation will resonate far beyond—through the large recognition display honoring him inside the Raven Precision Agriculture Center at SDSU and through the lives his gift is impacting.
“There are a lot of very charitable, very good people around Onida here,” Sovell says. “But Maynard was something more. If you knew him, and if you think about this last act of his … well, he was something special.”
By Steve Young
Young is a 1979 journalism graduate and an award-winning writer and reporter.
