Sometimes, urban girls like Brittany Johnson also feel the impulse to “escape into the mountains”. In 2018, she and her husband worked in an office at her father’s company, but often found themselves absentmindedly sketching the branding design of their future ranch on paper—a brand marked on cattle using a hot iron.
The couple used to live in the bustling suburbs of Washington state, but deep down they yearned for their own Montana ranch, to raise some Highland cattle, despite knowing almost nothing about farming.
“We were total city people at that time,” 34-year-old Johnson told The Epoch Times, “If we weren’t so determined to make this dream a reality, we would have failed a long time ago.”
They owned several rental properties and lived a typical suburban life. Johnson always felt like she was meant for city living: going to college, pursuing a career, enjoying luxury. She originally majored in psychology, intending to become a child life specialist, but in 2011, she gave up that dream and instead worked as a safety supervisor at her father’s trucking company.
But in 2017, everything changed—her father was diagnosed with late-stage colon cancer.
“My dad was my whole world,” Johnson said. She still remembers her father calling her at the office and saying, “Hey, sweetie, I have a tumor.” In that moment, she felt “like everything was about to end,” but in reality, it was just the surface of her inner desire to “escape” beginning to emerge.
After her father passed away in 2018, Johnson fell into emotional turmoil; a year later, her mother sold the company. The couple continued to work under the new boss. Her husband, 36-year-old Keith, was the operations director.
Later, they applied for a transfer to a more remote office in eastern Washington. When the request was approved, she felt that “this was God opening a door for us,” giving them the opportunity to say goodbye to the city and embrace the vast sky.
“Keith and I began to yearn to move to the countryside and set up a ranch,” Johnson said, “We drove to Montana to see houses while looking for properties online in Idaho and Wyoming.”
At night, they browsed the real estate website Zillow, and on weekends, they drove to Montana to survey land, looking for a plot they could afford with their savings from real estate investments.
In the end, Johnson’s early dream of Montana did not come true. Instead, Keith spontaneously found a ranch in eastern Washington. Johnson added that in January 2021—coincidentally the anniversary of her father’s death—they were lucky to sign a ranch contract.
“Neither my husband nor I have a background in rural life or running a ranch,” she said, “But we both have a firm belief in ‘anything can be learned,’ which is very important—because as agricultural novices, it’s no easy affair.”
Her first real encounter with ranch life came as a Mother’s Day surprise—a Highland heifer calf that Keith bought. At that time, they had neither suitable fences nor extra hay. They had to buy some small bales of hay at a high price from the local Tractor Supply store. Without hayracks, they improvised using old car tires as feed troughs.
Over time, they accumulated experience and wisdom bit by bit. With perseverance, they “crafted” themselves into ranch owners. In 2022, they officially launched their Highland cattle breeding program.
“Keith learned how to build fences,” Johnson said, “We bought our first livestock trailer, then a flatbed trailer to transport hay ourselves, and finally, we bought our first tractor.”
The community’s welcome also brought huge help. The previous ranch owner left a “secret list” with contacts for hay suppliers, veterinarians, and neighbors. Although the nearby small town had no traffic lights, no sidewalks, and no city center, the residents there were “very helpful,” Johnson said.
They lived in a newly renovated four-bedroom ranch-style house built in 2006, comfortably residing there with their three children, ranging in age from seven years to seven months. The two older children attend a small private school with a small class size.
For four years, their company, Hillside Highland Co., has been breeding unregistered Highland cattle, initially only selling calves. Now, their business has expanded to growing their own hay, purchasing Hereford cows, raising a herd of registered Highland cattle, and starting a beef sales business.
However, ranch life has also taught them the harsh reality.
“We heard a saying early on: ‘If you have livestock, it means you will also have deadstock,’ and that’s true,” Johnson said.
Once, on the day they had just unloaded the last batch of cattle from the trailer and successfully brought them into the ranch, the family was still celebrating when they witnessed the birth of their first calf, only to have it die on the way to the vet a few days later. “We did everything we could,” she said.
But equally, there are moments that make everything worthwhile. “There’s nothing better than a summer on the ranch,” she said, “The gentle and steady breeze through the cottonwood leaves, the warmth of the sun on your skin—it’s like paradise.”
While the ranching business has started to make a profit, it’s not enough to fully cover all the family’s expenses, so Keith continues to work. However, Johnson has come to understand that money is not the only measure of success.
She said, success is not about having a meticulously maintained ranch, not about how many acres of land or cattle you have.
“We measure success by the sense of inner peace after a hard day’s work, by the difficult experiences we’ve learned along the way, and by the pure joy of building everything with our own hands.”