No-Till Legend and founder of Martin Industries Howard Martin passed away Feb. 29, 2024, at the age of 79. He is credited with patenting the first ground-driven rotary row cleaner in 1988. 

Services will be Sunday March 3, 2024 at 2:00 p.m. at the Martin Home Place, 895 Chester Martin Lane Elkton, KY 42220. Visitation will be Saturday March 2, 2024 at the Martin Home Place from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. and on Sunday from 11:00 a.m. until the funeral hour at 2:00 p.m. at the Home place. Burial will follow in the Glenwood Cemetery on North Main St. Elkton, KY.

An Elkton, Ky., native, Howard was considered a renaissance man in the sense that he was a farmer, inventor and manufacturer all in one. He first tried no-till farming in the early 1970s and eventually came up with his row cleaner invention because he wasn’t satisfied with the equipment that was available for the practice at the time. 

A study done by Iowa State University about the correlation between crop residue and soil temperature made Howard want to find a better way to do things in a no-till system. Howard knew if he could find a way to push the residue aside and help the soil dry faster, he could raise the soil temperature and improve stands.

In the winter of 1983, he started working on what is now known as the Martin Row Cleaner. In the spring of 1984, he successfully tested his new invention and began manufacturing the row cleaners in 1991. Only one year later, he was supplying equipment to farmers across more than a dozen U.S. states.

Long after his invention took off, Martin  was still devoted to helping no-tillers around the world become more successful. Here’s a Q&A article he did with No-Till Farmer in December 2000 to help no-tillers address what he considered to be the 9 toughest and most common no-till corn planting problems. 

Howard Martin





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Martin was always willing to talk about his own experiences across the world of agriculture if it meant that someone else might learn from the mistakes he had already made and the challenges that he had worked hard to overcome. In April of 2013 he wrote an article for No-Till Farmer’s “What I’ve Learned from No-Tilling” series, and told his story in his own words, of how he began from humble beginnings and eventually grew his company, Martin Industries, to being able to supply equipment to thousands of dealers across multiple countries. 

But there were lessons learned in the early years before his company found international success. Martin learned how to represent his brand early on while facing challenges in getting his products to equipment dealers and customers and trying to live up to the promises of his sales representatives. In a 2011 No-Till Farmer article, Martin recalled how one dealer who wasn’t getting a product delivered in time asked him who was lying — Martin or his sales rep.

“I said, ‘Me, sir. I am the liar.’ I had to please the customer. I said, ‘All he’s telling you is what I’m telling him,’” Martin recalled. “I didn’t even bother to tell him that all I was telling the rep was what my supplier was telling me.

“If you want to be a man, you don’t pass the buck. And that’s what I wanted to be. And that’s what built our brand. We have a return on fixed assets of approximately 100% to 195% per year and that’s attributable to the brand, which goes back to honesty.”

Martin Industries was also recognized as a recipient of the No-Till Innovator Award in the Business & Service category in 2022. In receiving the award, Martin said “There’s no end to how much you can accomplish if you don’t mind who gets the credit. I always bragged on Mr. Keeton for being an encouragement and always bragged on Harry Young for being an inspiration. When I talked with people about the business, I’d find anybody that I could brag on except myself.”

Martin played a significant role in the overall timeline of the no-till revolution with his commitment to innovation, ingenuity and “against the grain” perseverance. Howard’s son, Steve Martin, who is currently the president of Martin Industries, said that he and his dad used to have frequent conversations about thinking outside of the box and not succumbing to norms when it didn’t make sense to. He says that his dad would always make the same comment:

“Well, if you were never taught what the box is, you don’t know you’re not thinking outside of it.”

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