At the Agricultural Fair last summer Sam and Bingo, black yearling steers yoked together, walked into the show ring beside 11-year-old Juniper Begin. At 4-foot-11 and 60 pounds, Juniper controlled her 500-pound pair of steers with a goad (a two-foot baton) and her voice.

Juniper is part of the Island’s 4-H program and she was competing in the Sidney Brock Morris Whippersnapper event.

Mr. Morris was a beloved Islander who died on July 9, 2024. He was an important presence at the Agricultural Fair, often with his oxen, Zeus and Apollo.

The Whippersnapper competition was named after Mr. Morris. In 1970, a young Sidney traveled around Europe in a VW bus and then bought a five-ton truck to travel in Africa. When he returned to the United States, he married Margaret Knight and moved to the Vineyard. While serving as education director of the FARM Institute in the 2010s, he initiated an ox-training program.

When we met at Slough Farm in 2023, Sidney pulled out his phone and showed me a video of oxen pulling a cart directed by a young man holding a goad, just as Juniper had.

“The teenagers trained those oxen by themselves,” Sidney said. “Those kids did all the work, and look at what they accomplished.”

“Ox” is an occupation, not a breed. Technically, the young animals like Sam and Bingo are “working steers” on track to become full-fledged oxen at age four.

My love affair with oxen started at my farm in New Hampshire, where all of my cattle have jobs. The bulls breed the cows, the cows give birth and the steers go into the beef program. I would have been happy to turn the whole place into a petting zoo, but selling beef made the farm viable. But I did find special jobs for two steers.

Like Sidney, it’s my mission to work with young people and cattle here on the Island. An 11-year-old girl controlling a pair of 500-pound steers with just a goad and her voice will build her confidence. She will learn that being a leader is not about yelling or fussing. It’s about being calm and assertive.

The Whippersnapper program ended about 10 years ago when the FARM Institute shifted its focus. In the winter of 2023-24, I decided to revive it and commuted monthly from New Hampshire to the Vineyard to work with the 4-H Katama Cowpokes. We would meet at Grey Barn, where the kids halter-trained, brushed and ran with the newborn calves. I needed calves as teaching assistants for the summer farm camp I was operating back home, so I went on a shopping spree and bought nine Grey Barn calves, including Sam and Bingo.

In 2024, Sam and Bingo spent the summer at my New Hampshire farm, so Juniper was given only three days to work with them before the competition at the Agricultural Fair.

“I didn’t think I had a chance to win but I didn’t give up,” Juniper recently told me. “The judges must have seen that I put in the effort.”

Margaret Knight, Sidney’s wife, and his daughter, Lily, presented the Whippersnapper Award to Juniper, Sam and Bingo.

I met Sidney only once, but his legacy lives on with the Whippersnapper award.

Meanwhile, the Katama Cowpokes are in training for this year’s Agricultural Fair. On Thursday, August 21, come to the Fair to see which 4-H participatn will receive the Whippersnapper award. Whoever it is, you can be sure that Sidney Brock Morris would have been pleased to see young teamsters and their animals in the ring.

The Whippersnapper award will be presented at the Agricultural Fair on Thursday at 11:30 a.m., preceded by the parade of oxen which begins at 10:30 a.m.

4-H Leaders Carole Soule and husband Bruce Dawson own Miles Smith Farm in Loudon, N.H., and spend winters on Martha’s Vineyard.