On an unseasonably warm January day, Duff Hallman’s goats and sheep wandered unhurried through the rocky hills of his ranch 30 miles south of San Angelo, Texas, unbothered by the long shadows that swept over the ground. The shadows fell from wind turbines towering 250 feet above, their blades spinning like clock hands over land that has been in Hallman’s family for four generations. From a shady spot in his backyard, Hallman can almost nod off watching them turn. “It slows your pace down a bit,” he said.
At 74, Hallman still feels honored to work the 9,200-acre ranch he owns with his brother and sister, sometimes putting in as much as 15 hours a day. The labor starts at dawn — mending fences, clearing pastures, tending horses and livestock — and is far from lucrative. He doesn’t do it for the money, but out of gratitude to those who kept the ranch going before him. “Somebody worked their tail off to make it happen,” he said. “And I have worked my tail off, too.”
