Jason Lobeck wishes he could travel back in time and learn more about the start of his family’s Heritage Farm, 3½ miles west of Tripoli.
He knows it was originally bought by two brothers, William and Louis Kuker (pronounced “keeker”), on Nov. 2, 1874.
He knows the first 100 acres were bought on the north side of the “Dinky” railroad line, with another 40 acres purchased in October 1875 on the south side.
He knows that the old farm house, which lasted until 2023, was built along with the barn in 1885.
But that was 11 years after the Kuker brothers first brought the land into the family.
“I always wondered what they did between 1874 and 1885,” Jason said.
When his ancestors eventually constructed the buildings, they built them a good distance from the road.
“Someone had said that the reason this farm was built so far back and not closer to the highway is because they didn’t want the hobos jumping off the train and coming to the farm,” he said.
What Jason knows for sure is that the farm has been in his family for more than 150 years now. It was recognized at last year’s Iowa State Fair as a Heritage Farm because of that.
The first owners, William and Louis, were born in Illinois, around Chicago. Their father, Henry, was born in Germany in 1812. Two years after William and Louis bought the land west of Tripoli, in 1876, the farm passed to their father.
Another two years after that, on June 6, 1878, Henry Kuker sold the land to another son, August, who had also been born in Illinois, in 1855.
August was Jason Lobeck’s great-grandfather. Jason has no idea why the land had three owners in such a short time period. (Four, if you count both William and Louis.) That’s another mystery.
August Kuker’s ownership lasted longer. He held the farm until his death in 1944, when it passed to his son, Walter Kuker.
Walter never married or had children. When he died in 1968, the farm passed to his brother, Gustav Kuker, who was Jason’s grandfather. He was the fifth deed-holder of the farm.
Gustav was already familiar with the heritage land.
“He grew up on this farm,” Jason explained. “Once he got married, he moved over just west of here to another Kuker farm, and that’s where he had his family. That’s where my mom was born and raised.”
The other Kuker farm was about half a mile west of the heritage farm, up a hill there.
When Gustav and Walter lived on adjoining farms, they farmed together, helping each other.
“One story that Mom would always tell,” Jason said, is that “when she and her mother went some place during the day, they always had to be home at noon because Walter was going to be there for dinner.”
While Jason’s mother, Pauline Kuker, was raised on a farm, his dad, Laverne Lobeck, was not.
“Dad was born and raised in Tripoli,” Jason said. “He was a town boy. But he always wanted to farm. He would go out to his grandpa’s farm south of Readlyn and help as much as he could. And then there was a couple of other area farmers around here that Dad would help.”
That love of farming eventually coincided with a love of Pauline, and Laverne and Pauline married. They moved to the Kuker heritage farm in December 1968, after Walter had died and Pauline’s dad had inherited it. Within a few years, they had bought the house and then the land.
“When Mom and Dad moved to this farm, my grandpa and grandma still lived on their farm next to them,” Jason clarified.
Grandpa Gustav’s wife, Hilda, died in 1972, and in 1974 the family moved a trailer house to the heritage farm.
“We lived in the farm house, and then my grandpa lived in the trailer house,” Jason said.
Gustav lived there until his death in 1978.
Jason and his sister, Deann, grew up on the farm. In 2000, Jason married his wife, Michelle, and they bought a house in Tripoli. Along came two girls, Brianna in 2002 and Natalie in 2006.
Having the house in town, their plan was that, eventually, they would switch places with his parents, when Laverne and Pauline where ready to retire and move off the farm. Plans changed, though. Laverne did retire from Bantam/Terex, but he still wanted to farm. Unfortunately, he had multiple cancers, so Jason and Michelle built their own house on the farm in 2001.
“We built a house out here so we could help him, help them,” he said.
In 2017, Lavern and Pauline moved to Sumner. Jason and Michelle lived with just their family on the farm now, while working off it. Jason works at the Schumacher Elevator Company in Denver, and Michelle works in radiology for Unity Point in Waterloo.
“Dad also worked off the farm,” Jason recalled. “His idea was that he was going to farm for a few years and work at Bantam, and then once farming got going good, that he was going to quit Bantam and work full time at farming, but that never happened.”
As Jason noted, “You’re talking about the early ‘70s, and this only being 100 acres….” Times were tough for farmers then. “Dad kind of saw the light.”
Like most farms in the area, the Kuker/Lobeck farm had originally supported livestock in addition to crops—notably cattle and hogs. That slowly changed over the years. Since Jason and Michelle have owned it, they grow corn and beans, and they’ve had some sheep for 4-H projects. Their current “livestock,” though, consists of bees.
“Last year I think we had about 12 hives,” Michelle said, which produced around 600 pounds of honey.
“It has been all the way up to 1,400 pounds,” Jason said.
The bee business is really their daughter Natalie’s, who started it as a 4-H project.
“She has a honey business,” Jason said, called Crane Creek Honey, because Crane Creek runs through the Lobeck farm.
Natalie is a freshman at UNI now—her older sister Brianna is in Iowa City, preparing to start medical school in the fall. Natalie is the one who knows the bee business and comes home most weekends.
“She’s still very much part of everything here,” her mom said.
Jason and Michelle plan to pass the farm to their daughters eventually. They reflected in an email on the long family history that makes that possible:
“We deeply appreciate the generations before us who worked tirelessly to keep this farm in our family, and we remain grateful for their efforts that allow us to have it today. Our hope is to continue their legacy and keep it within the family for future generations.”
