A handmade Broken Star quilt hangs over the desk in Don Tilmon's new office. The quilt, a high school graduation gift from his maternal grandmother, reminds him of his roots in the gumbo soil of Missouri's Bootheel, in the southeastern part of the state. It was there, the sharecropper's son says, that he learned the real hardships of being a farmer.

"You never forget picking cotton in the hot sun," Tilmon says, adding with a wry smile, "and, yes, I am old enough to have picked cotton by hand before harvest was automated."

Indeed, Tilmon never forgot. The Cooperative Extension farm management specialist for Delaware, he credits his early experience with motivating him to earn a university degree and pursue the business of farming.

"There's nothing like picking cotton to ...," he hesitates, searching for the right word, "to inspire one to go to college."

Tilmon earned a bachelor's degree in animal science from the University of Missouri, a master's degree in management from UD in 1967 and a doctorate in marketing from Purdue University. For more than 20 years, he has put his degrees to work in a career aimed at improving business management practices for farmers at local, state, regional and national levels.

Now, Tilmon is tackling another task. He has been named director of the newly formed Northeast Center for Risk Management Education (NCRME), located at the University.

The center will be funded by a five-year, $3.2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The agency chose Tilmon and the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources to receive the grant, citing Tilmon's reputation as a leader in the field of farm risk management.

Over the duration of the grant, he will establish outreach programs supporting the primary purpose of the center--educating farmers about the range of risk management opportunities available for their business. The region served encompasses New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland and Delaware.

According to Tilmon, risk management education for farmers became a priority of Congress with the Agricultural Risk Protection Act of 2000. USDA is funding other regional centers for risk management education across the country in the Midwest, South and West.

Until a few years ago, farm risk management concentrated on crop insurance issues, Tilmon says. The concept has expanded to include anything that helps farms remain profitable.

"While crop insurance is a big part of risk management education, it is not the only part," Tilmon says. "Programs offered at the Northeast center will span the spectrum of socioeconomic, environmental and health and safety issues that growers need to understand to stay competitive. We hope to offer programs on estate planning, federal standards, retirement, workers' compensation, hiring employees, futures and options, computer training--all the variables that go into running any well-managed business."

He adds that the importance of various risks changes with time and from grower to grower.

"On Delmarva, for example, environmental risks are in the forefront now, with concerns over poultry litter, water runoff and nutrient management," he says.

"Another priority is new products. We're working to get the word out on a new type of crop insurance in the Northeast. It's actually a revenue insurance, which insures the adjusted gross revenue from a grower's income tax form."

At the center, an advisory committee, composed of Tilmon and five NCRME members from the region who are leaders in the agricultural community, will review grant proposals from the private sector and Northeastern land-grant universities for agricultural education programs and will distribute project funds. In addition to addressing risk management issues, the new center will provide train-the-teacher workshops for county agents, extension specialists and people from the private sector who want to know more about risk management.

The center's first project is already well under way--a regional web site linked to the national library of information available on risk management.

At work in his office at the new center, with his treasured patchwork quilt as a backdrop, Tilmon smiles as he reflects on this tangible link to his early life. Pieced together by his grandmother, a hardworking farmer's wife, it symbolizes, he says, the starting point for his life's work. Not that he needs a reminder of the challenges of sharecrop farming.

"My father's legacy of hard work for small reward made me determined to study how to improve the business of farming," he says. "And, farming is big business. Risk management education makes American farmers competitive in a rapidly changing world. The Northeast Center for Risk Management Education is our opportunity to lead the way."

--Susan Morse Baldwin, AS '95M