William D. Knox — Obituary

Additional celebrations of Bill's life

W.D. Knox, a scholar and gentleman who guided an international dairy magazine for six decades, was an active civic and business leader and served as an adviser on agricultural and trade issues to six presidents, has died.

At his death Friday, Aug. 5, at age 85, “Bill” Knox was editor and publisher of Hoard’s Dairyman, as well as president of W.D. Hoard & Sons Co. in Fort Atkinson, parent company of the Daily Jefferson County Union.

Funeral services will be held at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 13, at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Fort Atkinson, with burial in Evergreen Cemetery. Friends may call from 5 to 8 p.m. Friday at Dunlap Memorial Home, and from 12:30 p.m. to the time of service Saturday at the church.

William David Knox was born on June 9, 1920, on the family farm outside of Sault Ste. Marie, Mich. He was the only child of dairy farmers Victor A. and Bertha (Byers) Knox.

His great grandfather, William C. Knox, was among the first 17 settlers of Sault Ste. Marie.

As Knox was growing up, his father was elected town treasurer and then to the Michigan House of Representatives. When his father later became speaker of the Michigan House, he was nicknamed by the Detroit newspapers as the “Iron Man of the North.” Victor Knox later went on to serve six terms in the U.S. Congress, representing the eastern upper peninsula and northern lower peninsula of Michigan.

The younger Knox attended country school and was a 4-H member for 10 years, compiling an enviable record. Besides winning many county accolades, he was a state honorary 4-H member in 1937. He owned his own herd of dairy animals and received several awards for his dairy cattle judging.

That Knox possessed leadership qualities early in life was evident by the fact that he served as a 4-H project leader for eight years and organized the Beneficial Extension Service in his county in 1936, serving as its president for two years. This organization later was recognized by the Michigan Rural Life Conference as the ideal type of older rural youth organization for the state.

His first experience in journalism came while in high school in Sault Ste. Marie when he served as editor of the high school paper. The Dairyman editor often reflected that the only poor grade he ever got in his life was a “D” in high school journalism ... the result of his outspoken editorials on the pricing of movie tickets.

Always the scholar, he was a member of the National Honor Society, graduating from high school at 15. Since he could not enter college until age 16, he spent the next 15 months farming with his father and running a milk delivery route.

Knox then worked his way through Michigan State University, first on the grounds crew and then as an aide in Dean E.L. Anthony’s office, where he met the likes of automobile pioneers Henry Ford and Charles Kettering.

One of his largest undertakings while in college was the establishment of a permanent 4-H camp for the State of Michigan, Camp Shaw, in 1938. Also while in college, he was a member of the Dairy, Agriculture, Economics and 4-H clubs and of the Michigan State dairy cattle judging team.

He was recognized for his scholastic achievements, being elected to Alpha Zeta, a national honorary agricultural fraternity, his sophomore year. He also was initiated into Alpha Gamma Rho, a national agricultural fraternity, serving as its vice noble ruler, noble ruler and pledge chairman. He also was named to the Blue Key national junior and Excalibur senior honorary societies.

Active in school politics, Knox was elected junior class president. He served on the Agricultural Council for four years and was a member of the university student council and the lecture course board. Knox graduated at age 20 with a degree in agricultural economics and dairy in 1941. His alma mater recognized him with its Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1966.
In 1941, Knox joined the Hoard’s Dairyman staff as youth editor, moving to Fort Atkinson with his new wife, the former Jane Edith Shaw, whom he married on June 15, 1941.

Knox enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1942 and was awarded a year of study at the Harvard Graduate School of Business under a program to train officers to coordinate the conversion of manufacturing plants to war material production.

After serving in the Atlantic, ferrying troops to North Africa, he was stationed for a short period at the Algiers, Louisiana, naval yard, and then went to the Pacific Theatre aboard the USS Achelous. When the war ended, he was off the coast of Korea, involved in the staging for the invasion of Japan. He was discharged as a lieutenant in the U.S. Naval Reserve.

Following the war, Knox rejoined Hoard’s Dairyman as associate editor. In 1949, at the age of 29, he became the third editor of the twice monthly magazine, following in the footsteps of dairy industry pioneers W.D. Hoard, who founded the magazine in 1885 and served as editor until his death in 1918, and A.J. Glover, who served as editor from 1918-49.

Knox was an activist editor, for several decades traveling more than 100,000 miles a year giving speeches, attending industry meetings, testifying before Congress and generally campaigning for a better dairy industry.

Through his editorial leadership, Knox became nationally prominent. He was founding chairman, secretary and president of the National Brucellosis Committee and chairman of the Wisconsin Brucellosis Committee. Wisconsin, in 1956, was the first major livestock state in the nation to be declared free of brucellosis, a cattle disease that is known as Undulant Fever when it is passed to humans.

Knox developed the Self-Help Dairy Stabilization program in 1954 and keynoted the formation meeting of the National Mastitis Council in 1960.

Knox’s dairy expertise was recognized by a half-dozen presidents.

During President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration, he was appointed by Agriculture Secretary Ezra Taft Benson to conduct federal hearings and advise the president and Congress on brucellosis-eradication programs. Knox was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to the bipartisan National Agricultural Advisory Commission in 1961 and was reappointed by Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon.

In 1971, Knox was selected by President Nixon to advise the administration on economic stabilization and international balance of payments. He was appointed by President Gerald Ford, in 1976, to the Advisory Committee on Trade Negotiations to counsel the President and Congress on the Tokyo Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations and was re-appointed by President Jimmy Carter.

Late in the Eisenhower administration Knox was asked to be undersecretary of agriculture, which he declined. In 1968, during the Wisconsin presidential primary, he was asked by the Johnson administration to become secretary of agriculture. He again declined. Three weeks later, Johnson withdrew from the presidential race.

Upon the death of W.D. Hoard Jr. in 1972, Knox took on the additional titles of president and general manager of W.D. Hoard & Sons Co., publisher of Hoard’s Dairyman and the Daily Jefferson County Union, as well as the operator of the Hoard’s Dairyman Farm.

Under his guidance, the Dairyman grew to a peak paid circulation of 365,000, covering 95 percent of the milk producers in the United States. As the number of dairy farmers declined, magazine circulation dropped to less than 100,000 while maintaining its coverage of 95 percent of domestic milk produced.

Knox arranged the launch of Japanese and Spanish language versions of the magazine. Hoard’s Dairyman today has subscribers in nearly 100 foreign countries.

As president, Knox made a concerted effort to broaden the company’s economic base. W.D. Hoard & Sons Co. purchased a regional farm magazine in the northeast and made limited investments in other companies. These were later sold. In addition, he purchased DCI Marketing of Milwaukee, the leading permanent point-of-purchase company in America. DCI was later spun off to shareholders.

Knox also led W.D. Hoard & Sons into the web offset printing business and the purchase, through an affiliate, Hometown News, of nine small community newspapers in the area. These continue on today.

Like many others in his generation, Knox came back from World War II with a sense of purpose and drive. What spare time he had was filled with his family, garden, golf and woodworking.

His constant curiosity caused him to bring seeds back from various agricultural experimental stations and test them in his own garden. It was this curiosity with seeds from a station in New York that resulted in his introducing butternut squash into the Midwest.

Knox also was active in the Fort Atkinson community, serving as president of the School District of Fort Atkinson Board of Education for 10 years, from 1948-59. During this time, Purdy and Rockwell elementary schools were built and a high school addition was completed. This marked a time when many rural districts were merging into the Fort Atkinson school district, creating a district that covered 100 square miles.

During his tenure, the board hired James F. Luther as superintendent. It insisted not only on comparing the progress of students against those of other districts through the Iowa Achievement Tests, but also following up with colleges on graduates’ progress as a way of strengthening the curriculum. One result was the adoption of a unique five-period day. At the end of Knox’s tenure on the school board, Fort Atkinson graduates were scoring in the 99th percentile on the achievement tests.

Knox funded a local American Association of University Women scholarship in his late wife, Jane’s, name as well as the Victor A. Knox and Bertha B. Knox scholarships in Sault Ste. Marie, Mich.

He was a founding member of the Fort Atkinson Beautification Council, was active in St. Peter’s Episcopal Church and served as a director of PremierBank.

As a 58-year member of the Fort Atkinson Rotary Club and a former president, Knox initiated the Top 20 Scholars banquets for high school freshmen and seniors. In 1987, he was recognized by the club with its top recognition, the honorary Paul Harris Fellow award.

In 1985, he was presented the Fort Atkinson Area Chamber of Commerce’s annual Economic Contribution Award. The honor recognized his leadership as Hoard’s Dairyman editor and for his efforts in local fund-raising drives, including those for the Dwight Foster Public Library renovation, and his work to secure Fort Atkinson as the site of the National Dairy Shrine.

“It is a privilege and a pleasure to live, work and contribute what you can in Fort Atkinson, and for Fort Atkinson,” Knox told the chamber upon receiving the plaque. “Our only hope is that circumstances will be such that my wife and I will be able to live the rest of our lives here.”

In 1988 the Fort Atkinson Lions Club honored Knox with its Distinguished Service Award for his community service.
At the time of the Lions award, presenter Pete Newell noted that Knox was known for “making pancakes — he’s the best darn pancake flipper in Fort Atkinson.” Knox practiced this “art” twice a year, at breakfasts held by St. Peter’s Episcopal Church and the Rotary Club.

On a more serious note, Newell said of Knox, “Without a doubt, he has done much to put Fort Atkinson on the map, and not only for people in America, but also for people of other countries of the world.”

Among the accomplishments for which the Lions recognized Knox was his leadership on the Fort Atkinson Beautification Council.

“It was in the rec room of our home in January 1960 when eight or 10 of us joined together and asked, ‘What did this community need to make it a better place to live?’” Knox recalled for the Lions. “We agreed to form the Fort Beautification Council ... the first organization to take the idea and go with it was the Lions Club. Every time I see a flowering crabapple (the city’s official tree promoted by the council), I think of the Lions Club and how they moved. You don’t put a yardstick on these things, but you see them and you love them.”

In 1999, the Fort Atkinson Science Fair was dedicated to Knox, “dairy scientist and president and publisher of Hoard’s Dairyman magazine,” and he was the keynote speaker at its awards ceremony.

He was the recipient of dozens of state, national and dairy international honors, among them an honorary doctor of law from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1973 and the College of Agriculture Distinguished service award, also from UW-Madison, in 1972.

He also was named the National Brucellosis Committee Distinguished Service Award recipient in 1957; honorary member of the American Veterinary Medical Association in 1957 and Wisconsin Veterinary Medical Association in 1962; National Dairy Shrine Guest of Honor in 1967; American Jersey Cattle Club Honorary member in 1968; World Dairy Expo Man of the Year in 1970 and American Dairy Science Association Distinguished Service Award recipient, both in 1970.

Knox also was the recipient of the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award in 1974; Wisconsin Friend of 4-H Award in 1983; American Guernsey Association Special Citation Award in 1992; and the American Dairy Science Association Fellow in 1997.

He also served as president of the Agricultural Publishers Association, director of the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance, a member of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Board of Visitors and as a trustee of the UW-Madison’s Research Park development.

Bill and Jane, who died in 1987, had four children: a daughter, Georgia K. (Jim) Mode, a retired physician who resides on a farm outside of Fort Atkinson; and three sons, W. David (Dedi) Knox II, president of the Chipstone Foundation, River Hills, Wis.; Randall S. (Carol) Knox, vice president of finance and business development of W.D. Hoard & Sons Co., Jefferson, and Brian V. (Terrie) Knox, executive vice president of W.D. Hoard & Sons Co. and publisher of the Daily Jefferson County Union, Fort Atkinson; 12 grandchildren and three great grandchildren.

He also is survived by his brother-in-law, Martin Buth of Grand Rapids, Mich., and two nephews.