The KMON MAGIE has been around for 43 years and I have been involved in it for about 38 of those years. That may be the longest streak of any other Central Montana Radio Network person, except Skip Walters who we sadly lost in 2022.

How is it possible that someone so young as myself can have that type of history…..yes, I called myself young…..alright, stop laughing, it wasn’t that funny….anyway, I am going to tell you my history with MAGIE.

MAGIE started in 1980 (or really close to that year) and I was 10 years old.  In the first couple of years there were several people that added the 4-H and FFA contests to the event.  The contests were Agronomy, Livestock judging and Meats Evaluation.  There were many people involved including, Duane Gebhardt from Cascade, Bill Jimmerson from Conrad, Sheryl Knowles of the Cascade County Extension, Cliff and Marie Crawford and my dad, Dick Bogden who owned Mickey’s Packing Plant. I apologize if I missed any names from the original group and will update the story if you let me know who I missed.

My involvement at such a tender age was very limited since it was my dad that did a lot of the carcass portion of the Meats Contest.  The first few contests, dad took a refrigerated truck to the fairgrounds with carcasses in the back to be judged for yield and quality grade.  The truck was near the grandstands as the retail ID portion was set under the grandstands on tables.  My role, load the truck and unload it when it came back to the plant.

Those early years converted to being a contestant starting in 1986 for the Cascade FFA Meats team.  My freshman year I took 5th individually and then I won the top FFA individual award my sophomore, junior and senior year. After that I was a group leader as a state officer and then…..I became a reasons taker.

That role continued until Cliff and Marie decided to step back and retire from the role of putting on the contest with the extension office. I took over the role with Aimee Hachigian-Gould in about, alright I don’t remember.  Aimee and I ran the contest until I stepped back in 2018-19.  Aimee’s sons Andrew and Brandon took it over at that point and work with Tom Andres of the Missoula FFA Chapter.

Now my role is as the Ag Director for KMON so I am still involved with MAGIE and with the 4-H and FFA contests. As we say goodbye to the 43rd annual MAGIE event, I am amazed at the various people I have met, talked to and have been inspired by.  Thank you for 43 (38 in my case) great years and I am already looking for to MAGIE 2024!

If you have a story idea or something you want to learn more about, give Randy a call at 406-788-3003 or send me an email at randall.bogden@townsquaremedia.com

Here is a photo gallery of this years event:

A Look Inside Magie 23

A look inside at some of the booth and vendors making up the Magie 2023