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Yes, Bernard is from fabled royalty, but the last thing he ever expects is for anyone to take it seriously. It has interesting entertainment value and is a great icebreaker story if anyone has the inclination, but Bernard Uechtritz prefers to think of himself as, “just a mongrel-bred kid from a large family with a colorful background.” And today, he strives to add to that history with challenges and unlikely victories of his own. A knight that defied an army. A couple who influenced a generation. And a bush-school, New Guinea-raised, drop-out kid who sells iconic properties. THE AMERIC AN DRE AM Uechtritz looks like native Texas cowboy, but his accent gives him away. In fact, Bloomberg Business wrote,
GROWING UP IN NEW GUINE A AND AUSTR ALIA AND MANAGING ... L ARGE L ABOR FORCES E ARLY ... TAUGHT UECHTRITZ
HOW TO NEGOTIATE E ARLY AND OF TEN. 50
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he is “a blue-eyed, square-jawed, 50-year-old who can pass for the Marlboro Man — until he greets you with ‘g’day’ in his Australian accent.”
cocoa and oil palm plantation. It’s still highly successful and sells its cocoa exclusively to a French chocolate company.”
“I admit that my Australian passport, PNG heritage and accent have been door openers for me, but hard work, long days and innovation got me the rest of the way,” said Uechtritz.
On the cattle side, he managed about 4,000 head and implemented the first large-scale artificial Insemination (AI) program for PNG, breeding European Charolais semen over gray Brahman and Santa Gertrudis cows.
Uechtritz is a third generation New Guinean, the eighth child of seven boys and four girls. Growing up in New Guinea and Australia and managing cattle stations and large labor forces early from about 17 years old taught Uechtritz how to negotiate early and often. Previously, in boarding schools across Australia, Uechtritz honed his negotiating skills in front of headmasters and disciplinary committees. He left school in the 10th grade. He then enrolled in an animal husbandry program at a junior college in the Outback, which was designed to prepare young people to run a cattle or sheep station. Uechtritz left the program a year early and returned to New Guinea, where he worked at a gas station near the gold mines in the Highlands. Then, he got a job breaking horses on a ranch. Before long, he had been promoted to assistant manager. “When the manager left, I got promoted again,” Uechtritz said. “I worked there several years and transformed part of the cattle ranch into a coconut, ICON GLOBAL
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“First try out of the gate, I inseminated 300 cows,” Uechtritz said. “Big mistake! It was overwhelmingly exhausting and took months. Later, I learned that most people take 10 or 20 cows at a time and develop a program from there.” About the time he turned 22, he decided to see the world. America was his first stop. He arrived in Kentucky with an AI certificate, a saddle, a Polocrosse racquet, a thousand dollars and big dreams. “I grew up watching John Wayne at the town movie matinée on a Saturday once a month about 50 miles from our station,” Uechtritz said. “He was a cowboy in the morning and a Marine in the afternoon — a hero in a nation of heroes. America loomed large in my imagination. Further fueling my fascination with America; our fondest family hobby as kids was searching for World War II relics across mountains, jungles and swamps of New Guinea. Among many such finds, my father and brother once found air crew remains in a B24 Bomber resulting in loved ones being