Artist: Richard Stewart Halstead (born 1947)
Tom Burke
BURKE, TOM (born 1943), inducted 2017
Tom Burke was raised on a family farm near Blooming Prairie, Minnesota, and earned early accolades in agriculture as an FFA officer and Star Farmer and a 4-H Club president. After completion of his military obligations, Burke joined the staff of the Drovers Journal; and in 1968, he joined J. B. McCorkle—a national Angus sale management firm—and carried on the business after Mr. McCorkle’s death in 1972. Tom Burke is the longest-serving Angus sale manager, overseeing thousands of registered Angus sales in nearly every state, seven provinces of Canada, the Caribbean, Mexico, and Scotland. He has addressed Angus Field Days in over 35 states and seven provinces of Canada. These extensive travels on behalf of the Angus breed once led Burke to be recognized as one of the most traveled people in America by USA Today.
Tom Burke was elected chairman of the All-American Angus Breeders’ Futurity in 1972, and in 1974, served on the Board of Directors of the International Live Stock Show in Chicago. In 1988, he was elected to the National Board of the National Suffolk Association and served as president 1994–1996. Burke has been recognized as a Marketer of the Year during the National Western Stock Show. In 2002, he judged the 29th Annual North American International Livestock Open Class Suffolk Show. Two years later, he was inducted into the American Angus Association’s Heritage Foundation. In 2006, he received the American Angus Association’s historic Herd Award, and in 2013, was elected to their Board of Directors. He served as a delegate to both the World Angus Secretariat in Mexico (2015) and the World Angus Forum in Edinburg, Scotland (2017). Tom Burke was honored by the Livestock Publication Council with the 2016 Lamplighter Award. He has authored twelve books highlighting the Angus breed and has served as president of the American Angus Hall of Fame since 1968.
Source: Saddle & Sirloin Guidebook 2026, p. 57