Gold-Plated Steaks

Jack Hoffman, a farm boy from Ida Grove, Iowa, bought a calf last year for $50. To feed his calf, a purebred white-faced Hereford named T. O. Pride, he paid out another $210.

Last week, 15-year-old Jack Hoffman got a jackpot return for his $260 investment. After T. 0. Pride had first been named junior champion and then grand champion steer at Kansas City's rich, famed American Royal livestock show, Jack Hoffman sold him. The auction price: $42,600 (the Government will get $19,801.80 of this unless Jack is able to deduct a sizeable amount as "operating expenses" and needed improvements on his 80-acre farm).

Prize bulls had brought higher prices. But at $35.50 a lb., the 1,200-lb. T. 0. Pride was far & away the costliest meat of all time (previous record for a steer: $11.50 a lb.). Sirloin steak from T. 0. Pride would be worth about $1,250 a lb.

T. 0. Pride's buyer, Eddie Williams, president of Kansas City's Williams Meat Co., which has been buying junior champions for 25 years, wasn't buying meat alone. He was buying publicity. T. O. Pride will be exhibited at hotel and restaurant trade conventions until Christmas. Then Williams will slaughter him, give away the gold-plated steaks as presents to customers.

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