Oregon rancher Doc Hatfield has died. Hatfield and his wife founded the cooperative Country Natural Beef, building it into one of the country’s leading producers of natural beef.

April Baer / OPBDoc and Connie Hatfield attended a campaign event for Eileen Brady last fall.

The coop got its start outside of Bend in early 1980’s.  It was a time when interest rates were through the roof and beef prices were on the floor and health concerns over red meat pervaded the public consciousness.

It was against that backdrop, that Hatfield and his wife Connie focused on lean hormone-free beef. 

Later the co-op would become an industry trailblazer in the promotion of sustainable land management.

Even as the business grew, Hatfield remained committed to its guiding principles.The co-op was set up in a way that kept the ownership in the hands of the family ranches and prevented it from being sold off to a larger company.

Here’s Hatfield in a 2009 interview with BeefMagazine.com.

“We’re hoping we’ve got a structure that will last through time and not have a life cycle like most businesses and then they get sold and then there’s something else.”

Doc Hatfield died of pancreatic cancer.  He was 74.

This story originally appeared on Oregon Public Broadcasting.