Veldman shares gift with city - Corsicana, TX - News Article Locations on Waymarking.com

Created by Lisa Perry, the artist who also did the oilfield worker, the farmer is the likeness of Lutzen Veldman, the father of Obe Veldman and grandfather of Nick Veldman, who owns the Beaton Meat Market.

Like the roughneck statue, this one was donated to the city as part of the arts in public project.

“We love it. We’re excited about this project,” said Sharla Allen, parks and recreation director for the City of Corsicana. “We want downtown to thrive and we love having art in these public places.”

The statue took about a year and a half from concept to completion, and an official dedication ceremony will take place Sept. 22, said Obe Veldman.

“When I saw the statue of the oil worker I thought ‘Corsicana is a farming community,’” Veldman explained. “I thought about various people who could be the face of the farmer and I thought ‘why not my father?”

Lutzen Veldman was born in the Netherlands and worked his entire life as a farmer and dairyman. The statue includes his wooden shoes, and a missing finger from his right hand, which Lutzen lost in a dairy accident.

It shows him with a bag of seed and he’s seemingly caught in mid-throw, as he casts the seeds out to the soil. The bag is inscribed with “Parable of the Sower Luke 4:4-8.”

“I don’t recall them every writing a business plan or budget on paper. It was their enormous faith in God that brought them through thick and thin and allowed them to prosper,” Obe recalled of his parents, Lutzen and Margareta Agricola. They raised 12 children, and Lutzen was a leader in his community. “My father touched so many lives, and in such a positive way.”