This Mother's Day, how a Central Illinois farming family juggles it all
PHYLLIS COULTER Illinois Farmer Today LAURA, Ill. â When Eleanor Basehoar was a little girl, instead of watching cartoons, she was out helping her dad on the farm as he worked with the equipment or the cattle. But she still never expected to be a pig farmer today. With her four daughters, she leads an operation with 2,480 hogs. Together they grow corn and soybeans, raise a few cattle for a local meat market and are entertained by some alpacas in the barnyard in Laura, Illinois, in Peoria County.  All that while holding a full-time microbiology job at the U.S. Departmen...