By Shelley Jones For Post-Tribune

Ask anyone who knew him and they will tell you the late Don Bloom, who passed away Jan. 5 after serving over 25 years as the 4-H beef superintendent for the Porter County Fair, was all about the kids. The many people who waited in line up to three hours to pay their respects at his visitation Thursday were a testament to that.

“He had a legacy,” said director of 4-H Extension Education Jen Myers. “You always saw him with a smile and he always took to heart providing an education to those kids.”

The three O’Keefe girls from Kouts, Molly, Kinsey, and Morganne, were, or are, all on track to be 10-year 4-H members in the beef project showing Angus and Simmental breeds. Molly received one of the special belt buckles Bloom, 78, of Westville, gave out to all the 10-year members.

Kinsey, now 17, began showing when she was 8. She remembers Bloom giving her a pep talk as she nervously prepared to go into the ring for the first time that summer with her heifer. He told her she’d been waiting and watching her older sister show her whole life and she was ready herself.

As the girls got older the encouragement continued. Molly, now 21 and in college, remembers a challenge she had. “I was a little shorter than my steer (which typically weigh 1,500 to 1,800 lbs.) and one year it was super hot and I had an incident with my steer and I wanted to go in for showmanship,” but that particular steer was no longer an option.

Bloom allowed an alternate animal so she could still show and was her biggest cheerleader.

“He was super proud that I wanted to go back in there and it was really nice that he cared,” she said.

The girls’ dad, Mike, who himself raises Angus beef, said Bloom was known to raise 70 to 80 head for many years at his Westville ranch where he lived with his wife, veterinarian Dr. Carol Bloom, who has operated Bloom Animal Hospital since 1974. He was a member of the National Western Stock Show and had recently scaled back to around 20 of his Bloom Angus.

“He was pretty proud of the genetic package he produced,” Mike O’Keefe said. “His name was well-known.”

The mentoring didn’t stop with the 4-H kids. Morgan Township agriculture teacher and head of the agriculture program for the Porter County Career Center Rachel Stoner knew Bloom as a 10-year 4-H member, four years of which she spent in the beef project. As she moved into leadership roles and adulthood, he continued to be her guide.

“He’s always been a mentor to me,” said Stoner, who first served on the Junior Fair Board starting in 2014, and then moved on to the Senior Fair Board in 2020. She said Bloom was “always encouraging, especially as I got into the Fair Board he just poured into me. Just so encouraging.”

For the past three years she was the beef carcass superintendent and said beef check-in with Bloom holds special memories for her. “That has been just one of my favorite parts of the fair,” Stoner said.

Shelley Jones is a freelancer.