Francis R. Childs was born on Aug. 30, 1939, in Delaware County, Iowa. His father, Ross, entered crop-growing contests, and Francis followed suit when he took over the family farm in 1966. The next year, he won the Iowa Master’s corn yield contest. He did not win it again for 20 years, attributing the dry spell to his own “unwillingness to innovate.” Francis Childs died 11 years ago, on Jan. 9, 2008 at age 68, but his world record dryland corn yield of 442.14 Bu/A still stands, while being eclipsed by the more recent irrigated yields of Randy Dowdy’s 521.39 Bu/A set in 2016 and the current record Dave Hula set in 2017 of 542.27 Bu/A.
Breaking the 300-bushel corn yield barrier
Ideas for increasing corn field yields and profits
Herman Warsaw moved onto his McLean County, Saybrook, Ill., farm in 1941. He bought it from a lender who had repossessed it from the previous …
