Recently, I had the privilege of speaking in the Bingham Gallery at Utah Valley University as part of the Roots of Knowledge Speaker Series. You can access the talk, titled “Engineering Beef: A Brief History of the Modern Steak” here. I’d love to get your thoughts and feedback.

Here’s a brief abstract:

Prior to World War II, most beef produced in the United States was raised by small farmers who employed the crops on their lands to fatten cattle and the manure from their livestock to replenish their soils. During the 1930s, a small cohort of Colorado farmers were determined to change that by abandoning crop farming and fattening cattle year-round. Their story provides the starting point for understanding why more than 90% of domestic beef today is fattened in massive commercial feedlots and disassembled in nearby slaughterhouses. As part of that story we’ll learn about how corn became such a critical feed, why pharmaceutical drugs are fed to most commercial livestock, and about the role agricultural colleges such as Utah State play in making meat. I’ll also introduce you to a five-foot tall Japanese-American researcher and centenarian who transformed cattle feeding. If you want to know the history behind the modern steak, join me!