It's a holiday that was born of the desire to honor access to food.

"Whether we're talking about the meat that often times is the center of the plate, or the vegetables or dessert, it all starts on a family farm or ranch somewhere in the United States," says John Kleiboeker with the Missouri Beef Industry Council.

Missouri now supports more than 105,000 family farms.

We rank second only to Texas and generate about $5.6 billion in farm receipts every year.

"One of our favorite statistics at the Department of Agriculture is four out of four people eat," says Missouri Agriculture Director John Hagler.

And to be sure, most of us take safe, inexpensive table food for granted. We don't see the economic, government policy, and environmental roadblocks that challenge every farmer every year.

A single farmer feeds 144 people in America, and Thanksgiving dinner as we know it would not be possible without him.

"The single biggest challenge, I think, is education...continuing to educate the consumer about the quality of the products we're producing and the value they're producing," says fifth-generation farmer Kelly Forck.