This is the story of a family that raised "Missouri mules." Tom and Vian were born on farms a few miles apart, went to the same one room rural school, married and went into the business of raising draft mules. Their daughter, Jessie, married a wheat farmer, Jake, who farmed in Kansas and used mules to till the soil. They were forced out of Kansas by mechanization, moved their family to the Missouri hill country where farming was still being done by horse and mule power. Their son became a veterinarian and showing mules became his hobby.