Whoever said you can’t teach an “older” dog new tricks doesn’t know Joe Freeman. 

The son of Mississippi sharecroppers, Joe Freeman spent his early years on a farm, earning his first nickels running errands for the farmer who owned it. He moved to Chicago as a teenager and spent most of his life there, including 40 years working for the White Castle fast-food chain.

Returning to Roots

Despite decades living outside rural America, Joe always had the desier to move back home, and when he retired from White Castle as a regional director in 2006, that’s just what he did. 

Laying the groundwork for his return, Joe first bought a 20-acre farm in 2003 near where he was born in 1948 and built a home for him and his wife, Rosemary. The Mississippi Land Bank provided financing for that purchase and for the 61-acre ranch he bought three years later. 

On the Same Page

“Branch Manager Joe Hill has a real love of the land, just like I do,” Joe said. “We’re on the same page, so it was a good fit working with him and the Land Bank.” 

Joe always intended to raise cattle, but the new ranch needed a lot of work to get ready to support a herd. Joe spent every day clearing bramble thickets, building fences and putting in ponds that would provide drinking water for the herd. He has since built a 30-head herd of cattle, but isn’t satisfied yet with his second career: he plans to eventually sell his current herd, a “scrap” herd built with an Angus bull, and buy and raise registered Angus cattle.