Nebraska Or California, Mosel Still Loves The Land

The hum of a drill, a welcome greeting and a short disclaimer.
​
“All I need to do is drive one screw and I’ll be ready to talk to you.”

This phrase was the first clue to what Doug Mosel is passionate about and finds most important.

For Mosel, growing up on a farm south of Orchard was a blessing. One he he still considers his time living and working on his family’s farm south of Orchard to be one of the greatest gifts of his life.

“I wouldn’t give up growing up on that farm for anything else in the world,” Mosel told ACN over the phone from his farm in Mendocino County California. “It has made me who I am yet today.”

Mosel has several fond memories of his time in rural Nebraska, among them were bartering with other students to get an extra milk at lunch, being compared to his super-star athlete older brother,  free-throw contests against the superintendent and another brother traveling
to town on a sled attached to one of their ponies in the infamous winter of 1948-49.

But his most treasured memories were on the farm, the way his family farmed using dry farm crop rotation, the native prairie grass, hay and a buffalo grass pasture.

“Just the memory of that place, rests most deeply in my memory,” he said.

It’s why he was so happy to return to farming in Mendocino valley. But before that he had a different life path. After graduating from Orchard, he bounced around a few colleges before finally settling on Concordia College in Chicago for his undergraduate degree.

It was here where he learned how to become a better thinker and writer while studying to become a Lutheran education minister. Concordia College is when the light bulb turned on for Mosel.

“I didn’t really know until I went to school there that I knew how to think,” Mosel said. “Because of the instructors I had and the way they taught, I realized I could think and I could write. It was a real enlightenment period for me. It deepened my understand of the world and of people, and that influenced me a lot in my work in the church.”

Mosel earned his Masters degree from Indiana University and was a minister for seven years. He noticed through his time in college and as a minister that he had a skill in consulting and team-building. 

The majority of his career was spent in organizing and helping groups work more efficiently together.

“I discovered I had a talent to help people think well together and structuring ways of working together that would reach better decisions and solve problems and improve work relationships.”

He even co-authored the book, “Benchmarking in Healthcare.” that was influenced by his career in organization and quality management.

After moving to Mendocino County in 1999, Mosel coordinated the voter that made the county the first in the U.S to ban the growth of genetically engineered crops. He warded off a large company that spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to shoot down the bill.

He now farms the nutrient rich land in Mendocino County, growing various crops in vineyards, using hand-me-down equipment and using many of the same tactics his family used growing up on the farm in Nebraska, providing food for local use.

Mosel wanted it known how much it means to him to grow his own food for himself and his community.

“It’s truly rewarding,” he said. “For me it’s a really important part of my story.”

Mosel hasn’t been back to Orchard since 2001 for a reunion. But when he has made it back to Orchard, after being away for so long, it serves as a reminder of the beauty of Nebraska.

“When one is young, one doesn’t always appreciate the beauty of the place they are,” Mosel said. “I had to be an adult to realize the beauty of the Sandhills, the Niobrara River Valley and the Platte River Valley. Nebraska is a very special place and will remain so for me until I die”

Mosel wanted those at ACN and the community of Orchard how grateful he was to be featured. 

​“I want to to thank you for the privilege of talking with you and doing this story. It has touched my heart more than I thought it might to reflect with you,” he said.