Cornell CALS undergraduates awarded Richard Popp scholarships

About the Richard Popp Scholarship Fund

The Richard Popp Scholarship Fund was established in 1997 by his family, friends and colleagues. He was co-owner of Southview Farm of Castile and Groveland, New York, and achieved a local and national reputation as a creative, progressive and successful dairy farmer. 

Popp was born in Buffalo, New York, and spent most of his formative years in the Castile, New York, area. He graduated from Letchworth Central School in 1957 and four years later from the Cornell College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, where he was a member of Alpha Zeta Fraternity. His first job was as a Cooperative Extension educator in St. Lawrence County.

In 1964 Popp returned to Wyoming County, New York, to join James VanArsdale in a partnership in Southview Farm. Under Popp's leadership, the farm grew steadily.

Popp was involved in many agricultural organizations. He was a former president of Wyoming County Cooperative Extension, president of the National Dairy Herd Improvement Association, and served as a director of the Farm Bureau, the Advisory Council of the Cornell College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Northeast Dairy Producers Association.

But Popp's activities were not limited to dairy farming. He was involved in the Business Development Council of Wyoming County. In 1988 he was appointed director of the Buffalo Branch at the Federal Reserve Bank and was former president of the Letchworth Central School Board. He also served on the BOCES School Board of Livingston and Wyoming Counties.

Popp was past president of the First Baptist Church at Castile, where he also served as a trustee and deacon. He gave his financial expertise as a director of the Erie Niagara Insurance Company.

Popp was best known as an innovative, aggressive and enthusiastic dairy farmer. Through the years, he welcomed many groups and individuals to Southview Farm. He loved to share ideas, gain new insights and optimistically discuss the future and challenges of the dairy industry. He absolutely loved what he did, and it was obvious to all who knew him.

This scholarship is awarded in the spring to a senior undergraduate student in good academic standing who has spent all four years at Cornell in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences;  who has a major in either agricultural, resource and managerial economics, or in animal science; and who is preferably from Western New York or from a rural area.