Artist: Richard Stewart Halstead (born 1947)
Louis M. “Mick” Colvin
COLVIN, LOUIS M. (born 1938), inducted 2009
Louis M. “Mick” Colvin grew up on a Pennsylvania dairy farm, but he made his mark in the beef industry. After graduating from Pennsylvania State University in 1960, Colvin was hired as herdsman for Mole’s Hill Farm in Sharon, Connecticut. There, he raised the herd’s profile with three ILSE champions and a National Western champion. He earned his first four Angus cows—as rewards for his work—and earned the John B. Brown Memorial Trophy for herdsman of the year (1963). He had similar success managing Longleaf Plantation in Aiken, South Carolina. In 1968, Mick Colvin became a fieldman for the American Angus Association. As imported exotic breeds gained popularity, the number of cattle registered with the association dropped. The changing supply of beef caused the USDA to lower standards for top grades. Colvin, along with Fred Johnson and Harold Etling, developed a strategy to revitalize the market for high-quality beef. In 1978, Colvin and Johnson founded the Certified Angus Beef (CAB) Program.
Serving as executive director of CAB for twenty-two years, Colvin turned the concept of identifying and marketing quality beef into a worldwide brand. He retired in 1999 to devote more time to Colvin Angus Farm in West Salem, Ohio. Colvin was honored as a Penn State Distinguished Alumnus (1985) and Angus Heritage Foundation Hall of Fame recipient (1994). The same year his Saddle & Sirloin portrait was hung, Mick Colvin was among the twenty-one charter members inducted into the Meat Industry Hall of Fame. CAB launched a scholarship fund in his name in 2025.
Source: Saddle & Sirloin Guidebook 2026, p. 69