John Sr. & Frances Aleman

Congratulations to John Sr. and Frances Aleman family for their nomination posthumously into the Arizona Farming and Ranching Hall of Fame. They will join other sheep families that have been honored in the past.  The induction ceremony will take place in February 2024 at the Wigwam Hotel, Litchfield Park.

This blog has written about Frances Aleman in the past. Included is some information on John Sr. as well as Frances.

The Aleman family is only one of the many families who made the great sheep era here in Arizona possible.  There once were almost two million sheep in Arizona and now there is only a few thousand, not counting those sheep on the Native American reservations or small flocks owned by individuals. The Aleman’s contributed in their own ways to its legacy in the promotion of lamb and wool both here in Arizona and nationally.

Juan Manual Aleman, a Spanish-Basque from the Pyrenees Mountains of Spain, was born August 1894.  He came to America in March 1914 and started as a camp cook for a sheep company in Winslow, Arizona.  A few months later he moved to Flagstaff and went to work for MP Espil & MI Powers at Frisco Mountain Sheep Co.  He worked here for 12 years saving his money until 1926 when he partnered with Mike Echeverria in the Cross Mountain Sheep Company near Seligman, Arizona.  In 1935 he joined in partnership with Joe and Leon Pouquette northeast of Williams, Arizona.  After saving his money he was   finally able to start the John Aleman Sheep Company in 1952.  In 1967 his son, John Jr., joined him and they changed the name to John Aleman and Son Sheep Company.

He was an active sheep producer in Arizona for 58 years, a member of the Arizona Wool Growers Association of which he was a director for 27 years as well as a director for 20 years on the Kaibab Advisory Board.  He was listed in Who Is Who in Arizona in 1958.

John met his wife, Frances Abbie Hendrix, who was born in Illinois and migrated out to Arizona from St. Louis in 1929, at her father’s Box H Ranch near St. Johns, Arizona. They enjoyed a very unique courtship riding the range on horseback and working with the sheep.  They were married July 1936 in Phoenix. It was the beginning of a wonderful life they spent together for over thirty-six years.

Frances became very active in promoting lamb and wool and in 1948 she, along with Ora Chipman, of Utah, co-founded the Make It Yourself With Wool competition which was sponsored by the Women’s Auxiliary to the National Wool Growers’ Association.  In 1968 the American Sheep Producers Council started the annual Aleman-Chipman Scholarship Award for the senior winner in honor of their contribution to introducing young people from across the country to the beauty of woolen garments.

In 1958, Frances, along with several other women in Arizona’s sheep industry, started the Arizona Wool Growers’ Auxiliary. She was the Charter President and served for twelve consecutive years.  She also served in each of the National Women’s Auxiliary offices and was elected President of the national in January 1971 and served for two years.  Then she served an additional two years as the National Press Correspondent later being appointed as the Historian Chairman for the American Sheep Industry.  It was here that she spent over 3½ years gathering histories from sheep families across the country for the book “Sheep and Man An American Saga” printed by the American Sheep Producers Council in 1978.

Throughout these years, in addition to Make It Yourself With Wool, she organized and worked on many lamb and wool promotions including the National Miss Wool beauty pageant, demonstrations at numerous grade schools, high schools, ASU, UA, 4-H clubs, Boy and Girl Scouts, the Arizona State Fair and on television and numerous newspaper interviews.

An annual Lamb and Wool Fall Fiesta was held at Chris Town Mall where a complete sheep camp was set up including ewes and lambs and a sheep shearing exhibition.  On the last day of the fiesta a full-fledged sheep camp dinner was served to an average of over 1,000 people.  In 1968 she was named Woman of the Year by Chris Towners Business & Professional Women’s Club. She also served several years on the advisory board of the Town and Country Life Conference at the University of Arizona and was honored for her service.

She worked tirelessly to promote lamb and wool even while moving two times a year up and down the mountains between Buckeye and Williams, following her husband’s sheep outfit.  As a young girl, Frances suffered with tuberculosis losing part of a lung which weakened her and caused many bouts of illness and hospitalization throughout her life. She had a strong will and recovered many times to return to doing the things she loved so dearly, her family, cooking and especially her passion, promoting lamb and wool wherever she could .

She was a devout Baptist and taught Sunday School at the First Baptist Church in Buckeye and helped to support two missionaries.  Her husband John Sr. was a devout Catholic but they respected and supported each other’s beliefs.

Together they had one son, John Jr, who was born in 1943. He started working summers out at the Williams ranch at age 9, staying for a week at a time, helping the sheepherders, loading and moving the burros from camp to camp and hauling water, building fences and helping with the sheep.  He joined his father in ownership in 1967 along with his wife, Claudia Jo Nichols whom he had married in 1961.  They had two children, John III and Heidi Jo. The couple took over running the company when John Jr.’s  father passed away in 1972.   John Jr. and Claudia divorced in 1977.  He ran the company until 1978 when he sold the ewes and the ranch to Joe and Carmen Auza.  They continued to run feeder lambs together until 1980 when he married Kathy Wolfswinkel and started Aleman Sheep and Machine Company in Higley, Arizona.

John Jr.’s  daughter, Heidi Aleman-Serrano, joined his wife, Kathy, in continuing to help with the annual Make It With Wool state competition and continuing to sponsor the Aleman Memorial Scholarship in memory of Frances, John Sr and John Jr.  This year Make It With Wool will celebrate its 75^th anniversary as a national competition.  It is believed that Frances would be very happy that this competition is still going strong today. The family is proud of its part in the heritage of the sheep industry here in Arizona.