NOTE: Gratitude for historical research and compilation of this information to the year 1996 is expressed to Dr. Richard L. Willham, Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor of Agriculture and Professor Animal Science, and is taken from his book A Heritage of Leadership, A Story of the First 100 Years of the department at Iowa State University. The book was published in 1996.

C. F. Curtiss made livestock judging important at the college. Eye judgment was the method by which animals were evaluated and ranked on type -- that ideal combination of characteristics that better fits an animal for a specific purpose. The competition appealed to students since J. A. Craig initiated it when he was department head at Wisconsin before coming to the Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station in 1896.

The story goes that the department fielded a team in 1900 and was only 5th at the International in Chicago. This was not sufficient to lure prospective students to animal husbandry at Ames. The University of Illinois won the 1900 contest. They were coached by W. J. Kennedy on their faculty. Dean Curtiss hired W. J. kennedy to be head of animal husbandry when Curtiss became dean. Kenedy was a good coach and subsequently Iowa State retired the Spoor's Trophy, the bull in defiant stance by Isedore Bonheur, brother of Rosa who painted the famous Horse Fair, by winning the International contest in 1901, 1902 and 1903. This bronze graced the rotunda of Curtiss Hall from on on. (It is now proudly displayed in the Kildee Hall Ensminger Room.) The team won the horse judging in 1904, 1905, and 1906 and retired the horse trophy "Deux Amis" by Victor Peter. This bronze sculpture was displayed in the ISU President's Office in the late 1900's and is now also located in the Kildee Hall Ensminger Room. By 1912, Kennedy had become embroiled in a judging team scandal and was asked to leave the faculty for several reasons. By then J. H. Shepperd had taken over the running of the International Judging Contest and the situation was bettered.

To judge a class of four animals, students are given the criteria on which the definition of the type of the period is based. Then they evaluate the class in roughly one-quarter of an hour and often less. They then turn in the placings of the class on cards. Oral reasons are then presented to the instructor on why the student placed the class as he/she had done. The student presents reasons, based on the current type of definition. Many animal scientists have ignored judging because the past and even current criteria are sometimes faulty, especially when the stock can be performance-evaluated objectively. But it is the process and what is gained by the student that has caused many to continue judging at the collegiate level. Being able to amek a decision in shades of gray (no animal is perfect) and then justifying the decision makes leaders! This is true of all the judging teams, not just livestock.

What follows is a listing of the statistics of the livestock judging teams that since the first year of competition in 1900, our teams have been National Champions 20 times, more than any other department. That is, 21% of the time our students have been ranked tops over all the other competiting universities. This is quite a record.

Contest Codes
I	THE International Livestock Exposition	D	National Western at Denver
S	Sioux	IBS	IBF
H	Houston	NBS	National Barrow Show at Austin
MA	Mid American	MC	Mid Continent
R	American Royal	NC	National Cattle Congress
MS	MidSouth	IBE	Iowa Beef Expo
C	Denver Carlot	FW	Southwestern Livestock Show at Fort Worth
KSC	Kansas State College	NCS	North Central States
NA	North American Show