Perry, GA |

Last Winter, these livestock exhibitors’ lives were drastically changed, as their school’s barn burned down, taking their animals and months of hard work, time, and energy along with it. It was a moment that can only be described as devastating, however, now just over a year later, they’ve rebounded, put in the work, and are competing at the show they missed last year.

“It burnt down just exactly two weeks before Perry. So, we had went in October and we kind of got to see that side of things, but it was very sad to get to see your animal grow, and you would put so much time and effort into it, and you were working up to this point. And then for you not to be able to go through with it, and then you got to watch everybody still go and compete without you; it was definitely sad, and you kind of just felt let down, like all you had done was kind of to waste, but definitely this year has been nice to get back in the swing of things, and I’ve been able to learn from it that you can still move on, you can still work better this next year, and it’s gonna be okay,” says Kate Bearden, Southeast Whitfield Livestock Exhibitor.

This year, their show team is significantly smaller, as only a handful were able to house their animals at their homes, which of course, as Bearden says, presented new challenges.

“It definitely has impacted us since it’s burnt down, because you’re not able to have as big of a show team. It’s nice whenever you have the convenience of sharing the stands and the blowers at the school. But once it burnt and it’s at you’re at your house, you don’t have all those things at your access and you’re not able to have as many members, because a lot of the kids rely on the school to provide for the things that they need,” says Bearden.

Though the incident was no doubt a tragedy, the team turned it into an opportunity – one that demonstrates passion, resilience, and determination, especially when you have a great support system.

“It doesn’t matter whether we have a barn at the school. It doesn’t matter whether our group’s small or big, we’re still able to compete. We’re still able to do good and be able to come to Perry. I still was able to work with my goat at my house. I was able to send pictures back and forth to my ag teachers, and they were still able to give me input, even though it wasn’t in person. They were still able to say, ‘hey, you should brace it this way. You need to work with walking it and here’s just a few tips.” So I was able to move past whether the barn was there or not,” says Bearden.

“Our kids are tough, and their parents are tough, and their families are tough, and they work hard. And so, obviously when that happened, it took some time to grieve and to look back and reflect, but these students that decided to take that adversity and learn from it. And so, they decided, I’m not going to let something that frankly, they can’t control hold them down. So, they decided we’re going to house our animals at home. We’re still going to work hard, and we’re going to do what we love to do and that’s show livestock. And essentially, I think that comes back full circle with exactly why we do this, exactly why our students show livestock. They show livestock to learn how to handle adversity, to work hard and work with one another to get through issues that might occur,” Logan Hunter, Agriculture Teacher at Southeast Whitfield High School.

By: John Holcomb