COLUMBUS — The annual dairy banquet for the Department of Animal Sciences and the Buckeye Dairy Club was held May 10 at the new Nationwide and Ohio Farm Bureau 4-H Center on the Ohio State University campus in Columbus.
One of the highlights of the banquet was the induction of Wayne Dalton of Wakeman, Ohio, and Kent Hoblet of Starkville, Miss., into the Dairy Science Hall of Service.
This award was initiatied in 1952, with the objectives of recognizing worthy men and women who have made a substantial and noteworthy contribution toward the improvement of the dairy industry of Ohio, elevated the stature of dairy farmers, or inspired students enrolled at Ohio State University.
Wayne Dalton
Dalton was born in New London, Ohio. The Dalton family has been in farming and the registered Holstein business for three generations. The main farm in Wakeman was purchased by Wayne’s parents in 1937.
After graduating from Wakeman High School in 1951, and earning the FFA State Farmer Degree, Wayne attended Ohio State from 1952, to 1954, and was a charter member of the Buckeye Dairy Club. He served in the U.S. Army Artillery from 1956-1957, and then returned home to farm with his family.
In 1962, Dalton married Jane Forney Temm, and through the 1960s, he earned recognition and served his community.
He was president of the Huron County Farm Bureau and secretary-treasurer of the Huron-Erie County Holstein Club. In 1969, he became a director of the Milk Producers Federation and was a charter director of Milk Marketing, Inc.
By 1972, Dalton installed a Ross-Holm milking parlor. He also constructed a new bunker silo and freestall barn and switched his waste handling to a manure irrigation system.
Dalwood Farms was incorporated in 1974, and expanded from 100 to 250 registered Holstein cows and from 500 acres to 2,000 acres.
In the March 25, 1977, issue, he was featured on the cover of Hoard’s Dairyman. By 1981, Dalton was the first in Ohio to go online for dairy herd improvement records.
He was active in soil and water conservation and served on the Wakeman Township Zoning Board for 44 years.
In 1979, the Daltons began sponsoring an Ohio State University dairy science scholarship that has continued for 29 years.
Dalton served on the Ohio State University Dairy Science Advisory Board from 1992-1997 and on the College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences vice president’s development board from 1999 to 2008.
The Ohio State University will benefit from a Charitable Remainder Trust funded by the gift of a 200-acre Dalton family farm. The Daltons also have made recent contributions to the college’s endowment fund to support the World Food Prize and Scarlet and Gray Ag Day programs.
Having sold his registered Holstein herd in 1994, Dalton traveled to Papua, New Guinea, at the request of the Peace Corp to help the native people learn how to care for newly acquired dairy cattle. The Daltons also have participated in the dairy Extension tours to Europe, China, Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii and California.
In 1996, Dalton established the Dalton Community Park in Wakeman on 25 acres of donated land. In 2007, he began participating in the Western Reserve High School Endowment Scholarship for Agricultural Interest and provides scholarships for students graduating from the Wellington High School.
The Daltons have three grown children, four grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
Kent Hoblet
Hoblet is a native of Henry County, Ohio, and graduated with the doctorate of veterinary medicine degree from Ohio State University in 1971. He practiced veterinary medicine in Ashland County from 1971-1983.
He returned to Ohio State and in 1984, he received a master of science degree from the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine and accepted an assistant professor position in the same department. He became an associate professor in 1983, and was promoted to professor in 1988.
He served as acting chair of the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine from 1991-1992, and chair from 1992-2006.
Since 2006, Hoblet has been serving as dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Mississippi State University.
During his career at Ohio State he held an adjunct faculty appointment in the Department of Animal Sciences.
He has been to Venezuela as a dairy consultant; he also has provided professional instruction on milk quality and lameness in Egypt, Japan, Romania and Thailand.
He was selected as the Veterinarian of the Year in 2000, by the American Association of Extension Veterinarians and received the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2007, from the Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine.
For 22 years, Hoblet served the Ohio dairy industry as an Extension veterinarian. He also made more than 450 farm visits to Ohio dairy farms, with many of these visits involved in solving a mastitis or milk quality problem.
In the early 1990s, Hoblet started a research/Extension program on foot health and lameness. He was one of the first in the U.S. to conduct on-farm surveys to determine the magnitude of the problem. He developed a foot care workshop that was presented throughout the state.
He also actively participated in conducting some of the first research demonstrating the benefits on hoof health of feeding biotin to dairy cows.
Another Extension program developed by Hoblet that continues to have a substantial positive impact on Ohio’s dairy industry is the Dairy Expansion Workshops. In these workshops, participants learn how to evaluate dairy farms and determine whether they were viable candidates for expansion.
The recognition provided as a recipient of the Dairy Science Hall of Service Award acknowledges his impact on the Ohio dairy industry, the career of many students, the advancement of the veterinary profession in food animal health and the advancement in our understanding of mammary health and bovine lameness.
