Nebraska’s Natural Resources Districts used Husker Harvest Days as the backdrop to announce their 2016 Hall of Fame inductees, which includes one NRD board member, an employee and a supporter.

OUTSTANDING CONSERVATIONISTS: Nebraska’s NRDs announced their Hall of Fame honorees, which include Dayle Williamson (left), Glenn Johnson and James Irwin, pictured here with NARD President Jim Bendfeldt.

James Irwin
This year’s inductees included James Irwin, who served as an elected director of the Upper Niobrara White NRD for almost five decades. In the 1960s, Irwin was instrumental in the formation of the Box Butte County Irrigation Association. He has helped educate landowners over the years about water management issues and has voted in favor of policies addressing groundwater declines. Irwin has also developed the Irwin No-Till Demonstration Site on the north edge of Alliance to help local producers learn more about saving water and soil through no-till practices.

Glenn Johnson
Glenn Johnson was nominated by both the Papio-Missouri River NRD and the Lower Platte South NRD for induction into the Hall of Fame as an NRD employee. “Reflecting on my 44 years at Lower Platte South NRD, I am proud to be identified with Nebraska’s unique Natural Resources Districts and to be honored for my role in their growth to maturity and success,” Johnson said. Having grown up on a no-till farm near Wakefield, Johnson was an original employee at the Lower Platte South NRD when the NRD opened in 1972. He recently retired this year as that NRD’s general manager.

Dayle Williamson
The Hall of Fame honors for NRD supporter went to Dayle Williamson, who was nominated by Little Blue NRD. Born and raised on a farm near Ohiowa, Williamson worked diligently with the Unicameral to form Nebraska’s NRDs. He served as director of the Nebraska Natural Resources Commission until 2000. Since then, he continued to assist in the formation of the Department of Natural Resources.

“This award means a great deal to me because I was so heavily involved in the implementation of the NRDs,” Williamson said. “Certainly, the NRD organization was the right way to go all those years back.”

While the announcement of the honorees was made at Husker Harvest Days, official presentations were made at the Nebraska NRD annual conference banquet in late September. You can learn more online at nrdnet.org.