About Us
Bar Heart Angus has a long history and its story started in 1907 when the Armstrong’s came west from Nova Scotia.
They took up farming, which was quite a change from apple orchards and fishing they were used to. Four of the five children married and settled in Alberta.
Oly Armstrong married Ruth and they started a family while farming, rodeoing and guiding scientists through the Banff, Jasper and Ice field parks for several summers. In 1939, they finally settled on the Bobtail Farm, a great location 14 miles f rom Red Deer and 14 miles from Lacombe in the Joff re area. Their son, William Lee, also knows as Bill or Lee, went to the Eureka Valley School 5 miles down the road, eventually attending Satinwood School for his junior grades, and then Lacombe for High School.
It was in high school that Bill skipped class one day and attended a cow sale at Lacombe Pavilion where he purchased his first purebred Angus cow. He later went on to join the Angus association in 1954 as the Bobtail Farm.
His father, Oly, was so impressed with the cow when she calved that they bough more Angus bulls and cows from Henderson at Lacombe. They also purchased cattle from the Satinwood herd and f rom Mac McCoolough. Ruth had registered a brand of bar heart right rib and hence, the angus herd became Bar Heart Angus.
From then, they acquired a jumbo bull from Orin Hart and and bred many offspring f rom this great line. In the sixties, they purchase a bull, Bresee Acres Winnies Lad4 (known as “The Duke”) f rom the Lacombe Bull Sale. He produced such offspring as Bar Heart Winton, Winton’s Image Major General 6H, and Eureka Valley Major General. Bar Heart Winton was eventually bough by Bon View and S&W in the United States. His famous son was Bon View Winton 1342.
In 1976, the Bar Heart Angus herd was big enough to prompt Bill to move to another farm 2 miles away. He called it Eureka Valley, after his childhood school and the valley they lived in. However, his cattle brand remained as Bar Heart. Bill and Oly kept working together on the herd until Oly retired in Red Deer with Ruth in 1978 until Ruth passed in 1981 and Oly in 1986.
Bill purchased his dad’s cows and used the full Bar Heart herd with his Eureka Valley herd. He married Carol in 1958 and had five children. He belonged to mains associations, including the Lacombe Agriculture Society where they implemented the scrotal size measurement at the Lacombe Bull Sale. He also belonged to the Alberta Angus Association, among others, and really believed in the 4-H program as he had done it as a child. His children followed his path and became involved in the East
Lacombe 4-H Beef Club, which Bill led for several years. His children had great success with 4-H, competing for showmanship and grooming, and going onto provincial competitions in Edmonton at the spring shows, 4-H speech competition, and carcass placing. They were also involved in steer competitions and showed for other breeders at shows and sales.
Sadly, Bill passed away in August 2008, one month after receiving the CAA Over 50 Years Membership Award. Two of Bill’s children are currently involved in the cattle industry with his oldest running a commercial herd of cows with her family in Quesnel, B.C. and his second child, Georgina taking over the Bar Heart Angus herd with her husband, Ronnie. Georgina and Ronnie were married in 1987 and just recently celebrated their 35th anniversary in January 2022. They have two children, Oly, who is an electrician and Kim whos is actively involved in Farming in the Falun AB. Area.
Ronnie became interested in Red Angus and started his red herd in 2004, which is known as J Heart Angus today. J Heart Angus, which started with three bred heifers, has grown to thirty head in the last year. Georgina and Ronnie eventually settled in the Rimbey, Alberta area in 2007 and have been busy expanding the herd ever since.
Kim and her husband Curtis were married in 2017, they have a blended family that consists of 6 kids. Most of the kids are very active in the farm. They are located South East of Falun, on Curtis’s Family farm called Pohl Land and Cattle Ltd. They run a commercial Herd of 350 head and Kim and Curtis are establishing their own herd of purebreds that is currently around 125 head of Reds and Blacks. Each of the kids have a small herd of purebred cows. The kids are actively involved in 4-H and enjoy going to a few summer shows to showcase their projects.
