Ed Carlson was desperate.

It was a Saturday in February 1933, the depths of the Great Depression,

and he had just found two more dead cows in his barn.

A month earlier, two seemingly healthy heifers had collapsed and died of internal hemorrhages.

Week later, a bowl of his died of a simple puncture wound that just kept gushing and gushing blood.

Then that Saturday, two more heifers died, again with internal hemorrhages.

Five cows, all blood to death.

Now, this was not a good day to deal with the crisis.

A real Wisconsin blizzard was raging outside.

Temperatures had dropped well below zero.

But if Ed Carlson lost any more cows, he was ruined. His farm gone.

So, using all his strength, he loaded one dead heifer into his peckthup.

He also filled a milkpale with blood from the other dead cow.

Then he grabbed some tuss of clover that he'd been feeding the cows.

Then, he set off into the blizzard.

You can imagine the conditions.

Slippery roads, blinding snow, his pickup shaking in the wind,

and a mile after mile with no company except that dead cow.

Veterinarians had been warning farmers for a decade by then.

Do not feed your cows, sweet clover. They'll bleed to death.

Ed Carlson though thought that that was all a bunch of bull sugar.

His daddy had fed cows, sweet clover, and his daddy's daddy had too.

...