{"id":17766,"date":"2022-11-15T09:29:02","date_gmt":"2022-11-15T14:29:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pfb.com\/?p=17766"},"modified":"2025-08-11T10:02:20","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T10:02:20","slug":"22-dsagaward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nustreamdesigns.xyz\/pfb\/22-dsagaward\/","title":{"rendered":"Tioga\/Potter\u2019s Edward Heyler Earns Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Tioga\/Potter\u2019s Edward Heyler Earns Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award<\/h3><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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For Immediate Release:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contact: <\/span>David Varner, Media & Marketing Specialist
717-731-3541<\/a> | dwvarner@pfb.com<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tioga\/Potter County\u2019s Edward Heyler Receives Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HERSHEY \u2014 From a young age, Ed Heyler was immersed in agriculture. Having grown up on a century farm in Northern Pennsylvania, farming was simply in his blood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following two years in the Air Force during World War II, Heyler pondered two career paths: farming or teaching. After mulling his options, Heyler pursued a career in teaching agriculture, blending his two passions, before eventually deciding to do both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I got out of the service I went to Penn State on the GI Bill,\u201d Heyler said. \u201c(When I returned from the war) I wasn\u2019t sure whether I wanted to farm or teach and I\u2019ve done both since then. I went to school and wasn\u2019t sure what I wanted to do, but I knew I wanted to be involved in agriculture. I was given an offer to teach, and it was the only teaching job I ever had.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heyler taught vocational agriculture for 33 years in the Northern Tioga School District, primarily at Cowanesque Valley Junior\/Senior High School. Heyler began teaching in 1950 and retired in 1983.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, Heyler, a Farm Bureau member since 1965, longed to have a farm of his own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI still needed to get my hands in farming,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cSo, when this place came up for sale \u2013 it was a retired farm that had not been farmed in years \u2013 we bought it and we built it from there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, after 72 years in the field, the 97-year-old Heyler still runs his beef cattle farm in Westfield, along with his son Marty. Heyler, to the amazement of his five children, Sam, Dan, Dick, Marty and Nancy. Heyler never passes on an opportunity to get work done in the field, Dick notes, recalling his father\u2019s most recent birthday party in August, during which his father left to go bale hay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The spry and tenacious farmer wouldn\u2019t have it any other way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt makes you get up in the morning,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cThere\u2019s work that must be done. I\u2019ve always said that farming is a little bit different than business. I can\u2019t just decide to lock the door and say this is it. There are crops growing which need to be taken care of and there\u2019s livestock that needs to be fed, so you go out and you do what you need to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For his dedication to agriculture, Ed Heyler was recognized by the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau with the 2022 Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award at Pennsylvania Farm Bureau\u2019s 72nd Annual Meeting, Nov. 14-16, in Hershey. The award is presented to an individual whose dedicated work and service has significantly contributed to the advancement of Pennsylvania agriculture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once Heyler purchased his farm in 1953, the family renovated what was a barely livable house into a family farmhouse with five bedrooms, two bathrooms, two living rooms and a kitchen and living room. Heyler built a barn with some help from his neighbors and two sheds that were added alongside the barn. A pole barn and a greenhouse to accommodate the family\u2019s plant business was also constructed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heyler originally managed a poultry farm that at one time included 2,000 laying hens and replacement pullets, along with 100 turkeys, 120 capons and around 600 broiler chickens which they dressed themselves and sold locally to the fresh market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the 1970s, Heyler was forced to change direction when a loss of rail service to New York City hampered their egg market and after suffering from a farming accident in the 1970s, it became difficult for Ed to dress poultry, so he exited the poultry business and started a small cow\/calf beef operation that he still runs today. Heyler also continues to grow corn, oats, and hay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe types of livestock we\u2019ve raised has changed over the years,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cWe started with laying hens and a side of capons and turkeys. I worked at those on nights and weekends because I was still teaching. We lost our egg market because we shipped on the railroad to New York City and then that ended, so we needed to do something different. We decided to switch to beef. My son Marty bought a farm adjacent to mine and we run our cattle together. Basically, it\u2019s a cow\/calf operation with some freezer beef on the side.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ed maintained the farm over the years, while his wife Dorna helped run the greenhouse. The greenhouse grew over the years and by the mid-2000s the family was selling thousands of packs of bedding plants, flowers, and vegetables \u2013 as well as designing and creating memorial urns and pots for Memorial Day. The family even constructed a small roadside stand where they sold strawberries, vegetables, fall produce and sweet corn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe also had the greenhouse which we started with a six-by-six hot bed and ended up with two greenhouses,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cWe only quit using the greenhouse in 2019 because I lost my wife, and I was getting older, and my health was not so good. We sold the greenhouse and now we concentrate just on the beef.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the classroom Heyler\u2019s impact on his students and the field was widespread. Heyler expanded Cowanesque Valley\u2019s agriculture program to require two full-time instructors and had added a 15-station welding facility and course, which expanded into allowing adults to take classes in the evening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his community, Heyler has been a longtime lay speaker and has been a member of the United Methodist Church since the 1950s. Heyler has also conducted numerous funeral services of community and family members, sometimes conducting one or two per month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heyler is proud of what he was able to accomplish in the classroom and is elated to see the success of his former students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI can still go around the community and say I had him in school and he\u2019s doing well, or I had her in school and she\u2019s doing well,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cIt\u2019s a very rewarding occupation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The same is true of his farm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was a good place for me to let off steam,\u201d Heyler said. \u201cIf I had a bad day at school I could come down and get on my tractor over on the hill and plow or do whatever needed to be done and I\u2019d feel better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Heyler, continuing to farm alongside his son and to have his children continue to come back to the farm has been everything he\u2019d dreamed of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just been a good living from the standpoint of you become assimilated as part of the community,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s a good place to raise a family. We had five children who have all turned out and they\u2019ve all done well. They still all come back when possible and help me. I\u2019m grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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