Limestone County native Donald Pressnell has been farming cotton for as long as he can remember. He began helping his dad at a young age, and even now, at 86, he still spends most days growing the crop on 60 or so acres of land, mostly by himself.

Limestone County resident Donald Pressnell said he cannot remember a time when he wasn’t in or around a cotton field growing up.

He said his dad took the seat off an old hay mower and bolted it to the tongue of his cultivator so his young son could ride in the fields with him.

“When he went to the field, I went to the field,” Pressnell said. “As far back as I can remember, I have been involved in farming. I still remember we farmed with mules back then.”

By the time Pressnell was around 12, he was driving a tractor and trailer stacked with bales of cotton to the gin in Athens on Mondays and Wednesdays at harvest time. He said he remembers often parking the tractor at Limestone Bank on his way back.

“I’d see Mr. John Huber, and I’d tell him, ‘Daddy said send him $500,’” Pressnell said. “He would always take care of making sure we had money to operate on before we got started. I would leave with $100 in silver, $100 in fives and the rest in ones, put in paper sacks. He would say, ‘Sign your name here, son,’ and off I went.”

Even now, at age 86, Pressnell still works 50 to 65 acres of cotton each year, mostly by himself, emanating from his house on Nick Davis Road. He said he cannot stand to sit idle — the cotton fields just seem to always be calling him.

Branching out

Pressnell graduated from Athens High School in 1953. He joined the United States Navy a few years later and served until 1957.

After training, he was stationed in Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. Pressnell said he worked as a quartermaster, saying he was in charge of keeping the ship’s records when underway. He said he was helmsman when the ship entered or exited port.

He traveled to many different areas while in the service, but he said the strangest place he ever went was the Arctic Circle.

“That was hard to get used to,” he said. “I was on a rescue and salvage vessel, and we escorted troop ships and supply ships. We went (to the Arctic Circle) twice, and it would be for about three months if everything went well.”

Pressnell got married Jan. 20, 1957, and by the middle of that year, he was back home in Limestone County, looking for work. He found a job with Monsanto in Decatur for two years, but during that time, he kept helping his father out in the field.

“I followed my dad constantly, and I learned a whole lot,” he said. “I hadn’t learned as much as I thought, though.”

Eventually, Pressnell went to work for Southern Airways as a baggage handler. He said the company was bought and sold several times before becoming Northwest Orient Airlines.

“For the last pretty good little while, I was the person that had to talk to you if you weren’t happy,” he said. “The bossman for the region would always end meetings by saying, ‘When that customer leaves your office, I want him happy, but don’t give away the store.’”

Pressnell worked there for 32 years before retiring.

On the move

Pressnell and his wife moved their family from Athens to 20 acres of land on Nick Davis Road in 1964. He said the first morning after they woke up, he asked his wife how she slept. She said she stayed in bed all night, listening to the sound of her own heartbeat, because the area was so quiet.

After retiring, Pressnell began farming cotton full-time. He said he worked from the ground up and eventually bought two other farms to end up with around 100 acres of land.

Pressnell’s daughter Felicia Phillips said he has never missed a cotton season in her life that she knows of.

“The only time I didn’t work in the field was when I was with Uncle Sam,” Pressnell said. “Basically, all I do is raise cotton. Sometimes I get some help at busier times of the season, but mostly, I’m by myself.”

Much like Pressnell did with his dad, Phillips said her son Hayden spent a lot of time in the fields with his grandfather while growing up. A 20-year-old drawing that Hayden made of his grandfather’s tractor still hangs framed in the man’s kitchen. It is colored in the trademark green and yellow of John Deere tractors, Pressnell’s favorite brand.

These days, Pressnell said he doesn’t farm the whole 100 acres anymore, more like 50 to 65. He said he plans to remain a farmer for as long as his health stays good.

“I can’t come in here, sit in a chair and just sit there,” he said. “The month of February is terrible. I know planting time is getting close, and I’m itching to get out there and keep going.”

Keeping on

Pressnell said his family, especially his wife, has helped him through some tough times over the years. Phillips said her mother passed away four years ago, and she believes continuing to work the fields helps her father keep his mind occupied and gives him purpose. The couple had been married for 60 years.

“For him to be doing this by himself at 86 is incredible,” she said. “He still gets up every day and goes to work. Farming is just who he is.”

Pressnell said his cotton crops are doing well this year thanks to the rain the county has seen so far this season. Though he said farming these days is totally different than when he was working the fields with his father, the end goal remains the same.

“You can get out there, use what you’ve learned and make something out of it,” he said. “You have accomplished something when you grow a crop. Sometimes, you make a mistake, but you have to learn from that and keep going.”