(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - The 1920s were a big decade for new businesses in central Illinois.

State Farm, Caterpillar, Growmark, and Country Financial all got their starts in the '20s and are still thriving today.

Country Financial is one of the largest employers in McLean County, and it's celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.

We have Bill Kemp, historian from the McLean County Museum of History, and Andy Bender, senior vice president and deputy general counsel for Country Financial and the Illinois Farm Bureau.

Thank you both for coming in.

- Oh, thanks for having us.

- Thank you.

- Great to be here.

- Congratulations on the 100 years.

Something that not a lot of people can lay claim to these days.

- It's fantastic.

Yeah, it's a big event.

Any organization that can make it a hundred years, it's something special, and we're looking forward to our next a hundred years.

- All right, well, we know it's not easy.

I wanna kind of take people through a timeline of how Country got started and how it got to where it is today.

But first I wanna talk a little bit about the exhibit that's at the McLean County Museum of History.

Bill, tell us a little bit about what people can expect when they go to the museum as far as the Country exhibit.

- Sure, we're partnering with Country Financial for the entire calendar year, 2025, to do a lot of really neat things to celebrate this major employer and its role in shaping the 20th century history of our community.

So we have an exhibit on our main floor off the rotunda.

It's a wonderful exhibit created by Country Financial staff using Illinois Farm Bureau archives.

It has apparel, signage.

It has a wonderful timeline.

If you need to brush up on your Country Financial history, this is the best place to go.

But we are partnering in other ways as well.

Tuesdays at the museum for 2025 will be free thanks to the financial support of Country Financial.

And we also have two programs.

On September 16th, I'm giving an evening program on the story, the fascinating story, of Country's relocation from downtown Chicago to downstate Illinois.

And then on October 9th, we're having a lunch and learn program, an afternoon program, on the history of Country Financial.

- Very good.

Now, when we talk about the archives, do you have like a big warehouse like in "Raiders of the Lost Arc" where you can get lost in?

- Unfortunately not.

We do have some extensive areas in our building where we store various items and we have a full-time archivist who dedicates a lot of time to taking care of those items, cataloging them, making sure we can find things when we need them and pay attention to the importance of our history.

- [Mark] And we're gonna show folks some pictures of some of those items as we go along.

You both mentioned the Illinois Farm Bureau.

What is the connection between Country and the Farm Bureau?

- Well, I guess I would jump back and maybe talk a little bit about how we all got started, if you will.

So you mentioned the 1920s.

The Illinois Agricultural Association, what we all really commonly know as the Illinois Farm Bureau, that got its start in 1916 here in Illinois.

And as they were helping out farmers, they looked at the early 1920s, you had a real issue with farmers getting insurance or, really, adequate insurance on their farm buildings in Illinois.

And so in the early '20s, the Illinois Farm Bureau started talking about, "This is a problem for our farmers, how do we go about solving it?"

And most folks were getting their insurance at that time through small township mutual companies, and they couldn't get adequate insurance.

So the Farm Bureau started talking about, "Let's form an entity to make sure that we can get them proper insurance."

And that entity was Farmers Mutual Reinsurance Company, which was the first insurance company formed by the Illinois Farm Bureau.

And today, the successors to that company, Country Mutual Insurance Company, that's one of our writing companies today.

- Okay, and one of the, as I was doing research, one of the terms I kept seeing was reinsurance.

- Reinsurance.

- Is that different than insurance?

- So it started as a reinsurance company.

I talked about those township mutuals.

They were really small companies kind of run part-time by farmers themselves.

And consequently, under state law, they could only write so much risk and they really couldn't write enough risk.

So what a reinsurance company does, and that's how the first company started, think of reinsurance as insurance for an insurance company, if you will, right?

So they can write more risk and spread it out.

Of course, what this reinsurance company realized very quickly was, "We can write these fire risks, we can write these weather risks on our own directly to these customers."

And that's what happened.

- Okay.

So explain to us a little bit about how Chicago factors into this.

It seems a little odd that maybe the big city, however big it was at the time, is where the headquarters for this company would be.

- So before the relocation to Bloomington, which occurs in stages from 1958 to 1961, the Illinois Agricultural Association, the Farm Bureau's headquarters, had always been in downtown Bloomington and it served their needs well.

Transportation hub, commodity center, Board of Trade, things of that nature, right?

Chicago is known as Nature's Metropolis.

It's a city really founded on the wealth of the countryside.

So it made sense.

But by the 1950s, Farm Bureau membership was kind of chafing a little bit.

They thought that their headquarters, for what was really the largest farmer organization statewide in the nation, that the headquarters should be closer to the membership, should be closer to farm country.

So in the spring of 1958, the Illinois Agricultural Association membership and the board voted to relocate somewhere in the midsection of the state of Illinois their new headquarters.

And that process would take several months to determine where exactly they were gonna locate that.

So Bloomington will compete with many communities in central Illinois for the right to host the headquarters.

- Now, with the company starting in the '20s, you know, we think of the '20s, the Roaring '20s, Depression, I mean, was that a good time to start a business like this or was it kind of risky?

- It absolutely was.

I mean, I talked about the Illinois Farm Bureau starting out in 1916.

That's, of course, in the middle of World War I.

You're sandwiched between two world wars.

You also have the Depression that you mentioned.

It was a difficult time.

But I think that's one of the unique things about Country and the Farm Bureau early on.

Particularly Country, they were writing really rural risk that didn't have availability of other insurance or adequacy of other insurance.

And so it was a very dedicated and loyal customer base tied to the Farm Bureau as well.

So I think that really drove the growth early on.

And of course, it caused Country to need to pivot at times.

One of the things I read about is during this period heading into the Depression, the Life Company, which was formed in around 1929, they needed to kind of pivot and that's when they first start offering a term life product as opposed to a whole life product.

So certainly there were challenges, but Country rose to those challenges and found ways to make it work during those difficult times.

- And do you know at what points, this obviously happened, like you said, because of farmers, at what point did other people start to come in and, you know, take advantage of these services?

- Yeah, certainly.

Primarily Country existed up until the mid-'60s as a company that wrote exclusively in the state of Illinois.

In addition, primarily focused on farmers and particularly rural risks.

When you hit the mid-'60s, well, a little bit before that, the leadership realizes, "Hey, listen, long term, to really be successful, we're gonna have to look outside the state of Illinois.

We're gonna have to look outside of, you know, those traditional farm clients and those rural clients."

And, you know, as insurance companies go, you obviously wanna spread your risk geographically as well as among different demographics.

So one of the developments that occurred in 1964, the Country Financial Group acquired a company out of Missouri.

That company was Mid-America Fire and Marine Insurance Company, and that was its first foray outside the state of Illinois, spreading that risk, finding new clientele, and moving into different areas.

- And, well, speaking of companies, I mean, Country has so many companies within the company.

You know, Country Mutual Insurance, Preferred Insurance, Casualty Insurance, Life Insurance, Investors Life Assurance Company, Trust Bank.

They got a lot going on.

How much of that is in more recent times as opposed to, you know, maybe the first 50 years of the company?

- I would say that's probably more of a symptom or effect of more modern times than it was back then.

But early on even you had, you know, separate companies.

We talked about the initial company starting in '25.

In '27, 1927, I guess I need to be clear now, 1927, that's when there was a formation of another company called Illinois Agricultural Mutual Insurance Company.

And that was in response to the success of the initial company covering, you know, farm properties, barns, structures.

Hey, we need an auto company.

And so an auto company was formed 1927.

At the time, one of the last Model Ts rolling off the assembly line up in Detroit.

They form an auto company.

So insurance companies typically do that.

They'll have companies that are responding to different needs and different risks.

And we talked about in 1929, they formed a life company to then provide those life products.

So today we're really a full service not just insurance company, but also a financial services company.

So we offer all sorts of products today, whether it's home, life, auto, crop insurance, farm insurance, small business insurance, and then a full suite of financial products.

And so a lot of those companies reflect the needs that our clients have that we fulfill through those various companies.

- Bill, do you think, you know, when this company started out of necessity in the '20s, do you think that other states were seeing similar issues with their farmers needing to have this kind of coverage?

- Sure, and you see this type of insurance network develop in other states as well during this period.

As an outsider looking in, what's fascinating about Country Financial is they've evolved dramatically since their founding in 1925.

They're a markedly different organization, but yet they've always kept their origin in mind, their roots in the countryside, right?

In 1925, they're established to help farmers cover for losses regarding fire and lightning, right?

Because, you know, hay is very combustible.

To lose a barn is a huge capital investment, to say nothing of the livestock or tools you might have in there, or crops.

So its development in the early 20th century is part and parcel with a lot of what's happening in the farm world and the agricultural land.

You see these kind of sharing risk, pooling resources.

The Farm Bureau is a wonderful example of that.

From the Farm Bureau comes the Home Bureau to assist farm wives, right?

And within the Illinois Agricultural Association, you have these kind of supply cooperatives, and Country's born out of that philosophy, right?

To assist people in the rural areas, but to do it to kind of share risk as well.

And keeping in mind all the while that you're making progress, you're bettering American life, right?

So this kind of optimism of the early 20th century, that's where Country was born.

- Looking at the timeline, you have some really interesting facts on the Country website.

10 years later in 1935, the first female representative was hired.

Would that have been a big deal back in 1935?

- Absolutely.

That was Anne Miller.

And actually, I think she was out of Amboy, I believe, if I have that right.

Yeah, she was the first female rep. She worked with the Life Company.

And I think that just shows, you know, early on, Country saw a need, saw a way to fill it, and we continue to do that today.

- Mm-hm.

And by 1949, the agency was established in all Illinois counties, had 400 full-time agents.

Roughly how many full-time agents do we have now?

- [Andy] Right now, throughout our 19 states, we have just shy of 2,000 what we call Country Financial representatives.

And they're really core to our business.

It's one of the things that differentiates us from other insurers and other financial providers.

- Mm-hm.

Let's go back to some of the things we might see at the exhibits at the McLean County History Museum.

Do you have any favorites or anything that stands out that you really think people should see?

- They have some wonderful early signage related to Country Insurance or Country Companies as it was formally known.

And there's a early life insurance placard or sign with a farm wife and her two children and the caption is, "Dad provided for us."

So the father is deceased, but yet he had Country life insurance and the family now has the financial protection they would not have otherwise have had.

And it's a wonderfully illustrated, almost life-size sign, and that might be one of my favorite items.

So I'm always have a soft spot for advertising.

- Yeah, that's pretty cool stuff.

Do you have any favorites?

- I was gonna refer not to that particular piece, but the advertising is really wonderful.

It gives you not only a picture into our company and where they stood at those various times, but as Bill mentioned, it really gives you a picture into American life at that time.

And so looking through all those advertisements, those print advertisements, they're really special to sort of capture the essence of what was going on at those times.

- Yeah, we're gonna be throwing some of those up on the screen so people can see them.

With such a big company and a growing company, how has Country had an impact on Bloomington-Normal and McLean County in terms of giving back to the community?

- Yeah, of course, we're a significant employer in the area.

We have just over 3,000 employees, not just in the Bloomington area, but we also have locations up in Minneapolis and down in Alpharetta, Georgia.

And not to mention, as I said, our Country Financial representatives who are throughout the country in our 19 states.

In addition to that, we try to partner with various organizations.

One such partnership that comes to mind is a partnership we have with Heartland Community College there in Bloomington.

Obviously we offer scholarships to students, but I think the important thing about those programs is we don't just offer money, which is important to those students, but we try to offer mentorship to them as well and interactions so they can see what sort of careers they might have in insurance or if that's the route they choose to go.

We also partner with my alma mater, which is Illinois State University, in a number of ways and other organizations.

In addition to that, other philanthropy we do, our employees have an opportunity to donate to causes that are important to them and we match a certain portion of those funds and those donations that they make to causes that are important to them.

I would also mention that our representatives out there in the 19 states, they have causes that are important to them.

They're embedded in these communities.

They're small business owners in these communities, and they do a lot.

And we have a particular program called Operation Helping Heroes, which gives them an opportunity to provide funds to first responders and teachers and things like that.

So, you know, I know we've made donations through that program, buying defibrillators or equipment that can help police and fire or ambulance.

So we try to give back in our communities.

In fact, you know, we talk about our vision statement being to enrich the lives in the communities we serve.

So we wanna be there for our clients always, not just the promises we make through our business, but to enrich those communities.

- Yeah, we see a lot of big businesses here in central Illinois.

Do you think, you know, giving back is something everyone's encouraged to do, but do you think that helps the business, I don't know, stay positive in the community, have a good image?

- Country's interesting because it keeps Bloomington-Normal, and the Illinois Agricultural Association in general, it keeps Bloomington-Normal rooted in its farm history in a way, right?

With the Illinois Agricultural Association, with Growmark, to a lesser extent, Country Financial, right?

McLean County is the largest county area wise in the state of Illinois of 102 counties.

So we're usually among the leader or the leader in corn and soybean production, not only in the state, but nationally, right?

So we've got this rich agricultural history with investment and banking and farm management, right?

So the health and vitality of Bloomington was really originally based in the wealth of the countryside, right?

And even though Bloomington-Normal has grown and diversified, we still have the Illinois Agriculture Association or the Farm Bureau and their headquarters to kind of remind us of where we came from.

- Well, it's easy to forget that, you know, agriculture is the engine that runs this state.

A lot of times, you know, you see it when you go down the highway, but you may not necessarily think about it.

- Absolutely.

- One thing that came to mind was the Washington tornado.

Obviously that impacted a lot of people.

How did it impact Country and how did Country deal with some of those hurdles?

- Well, you know, back in, I believe that was 2013, the Washington tornadoes obviously right in our backyard touched a lot of people.

If it didn't touch you personally, it certainly touched somebody you knew.

And it just, you know, the insurance industry, we're in the business of promises, right?

That's what we're selling.

We're selling a promise that we're gonna be there when you need us.

And I think it gave us an opportunity, an unfortunate opportunity, to really be there for our clients in central Illinois, help them out.

I think we had thousands, well, I know we had thousands of claims related to that particular tornado.

And I believe we had over a hundred homes that we insured that were either severely damaged or could not be, they were uninhabitable at the time.

And so it's just another instance of us being there for our clients and fulfilling those promises that we made, just as we've been doing since 1925.

- Does a big, I mean, not even a one-day event, a 15-minute event like that, does that put a big stress on the company?

- It's gonna do that with any company and, you know, there's a lot of insurance companies that are in the news today, you know, struggling or there's concern.

I mean, you pick up a newspaper or watch the news and you'll see that.

But that's one of the differentiators of Country, really, the financial wherewithal of the company.

And it goes back to our history and our founders and I think those folks, those very sensible farmers that started us out.

So there's a independent rating agency called AM Best that rates insurance companies, and for 90 consecutive years, Country Mutual and Country Life have had the highest rating that AM Best will give a company.

And that's another differentiator we have is we are there and we can fulfill those promises we make because of our financial wherewithal.

- When this exhibit came to be, I imagine one of the things that's really neat about looking at history of companies especially is how their logo changes.

You know, right now you guys have a very basic logo, but most of the time basic is better.

It's kind of evolved throughout the years.

Are we gonna see some of the different logos throughout the years at the exhibit?

- Well, currently now you get to see a full kind of range of the history of logos of Country and its company.

So if you have an interest in corporate logos or branding, as a lot of people do, that's a really nice exhibit right now for that.

- Well, I think right now it says Country Financial in the green oval.

I believe before it said Country and then Financial underneath it.

To me, it's just kind of interesting how psychology works out in these things.

And again, a basic logo now is, you can just see something that's an oval and green and white, you say, "Oh, that's Country."

- It's funny.

One of the first jobs I had with Country, I was a trademark attorney.

So I was involved with filing the trademark applications for a lot of those changes and I would go up to the head of marketing at the time, we talk about how we're changing, and, you know, the smarter marketing folks than I am knew why we were doing all that.

But I've been through a lot of that since I've been there 21 years.

And the thing I would say, and I don't mind this, still a lot of central Illinois knows us as Country Companies, which you'll see in a lot of the branding, which I think that came about, you might know better than me on this one, I think that came about in the '50s or '60s.

- Yes.

'50s I believe.

- '50s, yeah, so.

You know, I think any company is trying to change their logo and their outer image to reflect who they are.

And I think we are a straightforward company that's fulfilling our promises.

And it may be basic, but I think it speaks to the culture we have.

- So 100 years under your belts, what do you see in the future for this company as, I mean, it's very evolved in the last hundred years.

What does it need to do to be successful in the next hundred years?

- Well, we think about that all the time.

You know, I've been involved and when I came into my current position about five, six years ago, we were talking about our next five-year strategy and right now we've just launched the next iteration of that.

And we're always looking to find ways to better serve our clients, you know, real straightforward thing there, but, and just focus on what we call our core clients.

You know, we have sort of three groups we think about.

They're our homeowners, our farm owners, and our small business owners.

Now, we're happy to work with anybody, but those are the groups we tend to focus on.

As you see, part of that is looking to the future.

You know, we think about, hey, these small business owners, how can we help them?

But we're also respecting our past and our farm owners are and have always been and will be one of our core clients.

- Bill, tell us a little bit more about the exhibit, what people can expect and when and where they can see it.

- So the exhibit is on the main floor off our rotunda at the McLean County Museum of History, which is in the center of historic downtown.

We occupy the old courthouse.

It's kind of an iconic building in downtown Bloomington.

And again, the exhibit is on the rotunda on our main floor in the north hallway.

You can't miss it, on both sides.

And there are display cases and items that are displayed on tables as well, including a large timeline.

You get apparel as well.

So I don't know, was it the storm watch group, right?

We have a jacket from the group that would race to emergencies or disasters, right?

So we have one of those jackets on display, for example, so.

- Very cool.

Well, good excuse to go to the museum.

You have a lot of neat stuff over there and you're- - We do - Constantly changing, which is nice.

- Correct, yes, and if you're visiting the museum, in addition to the Country Financial exhibit, on that main floor, we've got five permanent exhibits which tell the story through objects and papers of Central Illinois' rich history.

- Very good, anything else you want folks to know about Country?

- I would just, you know, thank you for having us here.

I would thank the museum, which is an absolute gem and you really have to get out to see the museum.

And, of course, I'd like to thank our clients, our employees, and most especially our financial representatives out there who have helped us through our first hundred years and will help us through our next hundred years.

- Well, congratulations on that.

- Thank you.

- And thank you for being a big employer in the area.

We always need that.

Well, we have Bill Kemp, historian from the McLean County Museum of History, and Andy Bender, senior vice president and deputy general counsel for Country Financial and the Illinois Farm Bureau.

Gentlemen, thanks a lot for coming in.

- Thanks for having us.

- Thank you.

- All right.

And thank you for joining us.

We're gonna have this interview on our website, wtvp.org, very shortly if you wanna share that with any friends and you can check out "You Gotta See This" coming up next.

Have a good night.

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