A LASTING LEGACY MCPHEE FAMILY CARRIES ON RED ANGUS TRADITION by CCA Associate Director of Communications Maureen LaGrande Running a livestock operation that carries on from generation to generation is no easy feat. Obstacles, changes and triumphs are faced daily. The McPhee family of McPhee Red Angus, Lodi, have persevered over the years and to this day Roy and Nellie McPhee’s children continue to run their family’s Red Angus operation carrying on their legacy. Roy McPhee grew up in St. Joseph, Mo. on an Angus cattle operation up until he left for the Navy. Once he served his time, Roy McPhee planned to return home and run cattle with his father. But once he got off the boat and stepped foot on the West Coast, he never made it out of California. While planting his roots in the Golden State, Roy McPhee met his wife Nellie and found a career as an agriculture production credit banker in Stockton. With a job, wife and four children, the family made their home in the Lodi area. Rita McPhee, Roy and Nellie’s daughter shares that her parents always had cattle for as long as she can remember, and in 1971 they purchased five Red Angus females and a Red Angus bull at a dispersal sale. From there the McPhees continued to expand and grow their herd of red hided cattle over the years. Aside from the good temperament, mothering ability and resistance to heat, Roy’s likeness to the Red Angus breed was due to the high standards that the Red Angus Association of America (RAAA) held. To register an animal, the RAAA requires breeders to submit whether a female did or didn’t calve that year and document the birth
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and wean weight of the calf. About 10 years after the McPhees started their Red Angus operation, they hosted their first sale in the early ‘80s. For the first three years of the sale only females were offered for purchase until the family realized that if they sold all their good females, they wouldn’t have any left behind to continue building their genetics. With this in mind, the following year the family decided to start offering up both bulls and females to ensure they would still have breeding stock. To this day, the sale continues to take place at the McPhee’s home ranch. McPhee shares her father always wanted buyers to be able to see where the animals they were purchasing were raised and what better way to do that than host a sale where the cattle grew up. With both Roy and Nellie passed, their children are now the operators of the family ranch. Rita McPhee shares how she, two of her other siblings and her son Royce work full-time on the ranch. Royce serves as the next generation of the ranch’s future. “We’re a team, and completely support one another,” said McPhee. In her interview on the Stories from California Cattle Country Podcast, McPhee talks about how her father had a detailed plan in place for the family and ranch when he would no longer be around to run things. That strong plan has allowed the family to still proceed with the operation and have all their ducks in a row. She shared her father had the plan set up so well, her mom was able to run the ranch for 15 more years after his passing. With Nellie’s passing last June,