Basil Ralph Eastwood, age 86 of Round Hill, VA, formerly of Wisconsin.

Basil Ralph Eastwood was born December 17, 1936 at the Eastwood home ¾ of a mile East of Wiota, Wisconsin.  He attended Wiota grade school and Darlington High School, graduating in the class of 1954.  Basil participated in high school band, boys and mixed choruses and baseball.  He also was active in 4-H with projects in Jr. Leadership, Dairy, Swine, Sheep, Forestry, Tractor Maintenance and Electricity.  His main interests were Hampshire pigs and Holstein dairy cattle which he showed at local, district and State shows.  During these years Basil became an avid player of fast-pitch softball and continued to play through his college years.

He received a BS degree in Agricultural Education from Platteville State College (now University of Wisconsin-Platteville) in 1958 and his MS degree in Dairy Science at South Dakota State University in Brookings, SD in 1960.  Basil attended Michigan State University from 1960 to 1963 and received a PhD degree in Dairy Cattle Genetics in 1967.

Professionally, Basil served as Extension Dairy Specialist at the University of Massachusetts from 1963 to 1965 working in an educational capacity with producers in the dairy records program and with dairy youth.

From 1965 to 1980 he was an Extension Dairy Specialist at Iowa State University, attaining full professorship in 1975.  At Iowa State he led development of the first Estimated Producing Ability and Estimated Average Transmitting Ability evaluations of dairy cattle and their application in ranking cows for dairy producers.  He also developed the first Preliminary Sire Summaries, using records in progress for the first time, and provided these sire evaluations to animal breeding organizations.  The first genetic estimates of replacement heifers based on their parentage was another result of Basil's work with dairy records.

Basil served as the National Program Leader for Dairy at USDA-Washington, D.C. from 1980 until his retirement in 2007.  As National Program Leader he worked closely with the National Dairy Herd Improvement Association of producers and encouraged national cooperation among Extension specialists at the Land Grant Universities.  The goal of delivering the most useful knowledge to producers and others in the animal industries was energized through development of national informational databases on CD and the Internet.  Basil designed a system allowing the best experts from all States to lead formation of these databases.

Basil spent two months at the University of Costa Rica in 1979 as part of a professor exchange program with Iowa State University.  He also made trips to South Korea in 1977 and 1981 where he consulted with dairy industry organizations and made presentations to farmer and student groups.

Basil married Barbara Jean Schewe of Grand Rapids, Michigan on April 20, 1963 and they had two children, Elizabeth Jean, now deceased, and Charles Edwin of LaPlata, Maryland.  Basil and Barbara purchased a small farm in Northern Virginia where Basil completed his career and enjoyed his retirement years.  Basil's personal interests included raising and showing Arabian horses and Doberman Pinscher dogs; tree propagation, collecting antique furniture and Depression glass; vintage cars and farm machinery.  The property in Northern Virginia is adorned with many trees Basil started from seeds collected on his travels and are now magnificent specimens of all varieties on the farm.