blair underwood says he is living on a few acres in the mountains in Utah and raising bison, a setup he describes as far removed from Hollywood crowds. He framed the move as part of a family line that reaches into his late parents’ plans, especially his father’s wish to own a ranch.
“It's not a ranch, but it's [a] nice handful of acres up in the mountains,” he told Elizabeth Stanton. Underwood also said, “As an adult, I think a lot of this book is finishing my mom's dream. Having the buffalo is kind of finishing my dad's dream, though I incorporated that dream myself. And I do love bison, buffalo myself.”
Utah acres and bison
Underwood said he and his neighbors have been raising the animals for the past few years and splitting the costs. He partnered with the couple next door, who had already been raising bison, after seeing them on the property and telling his wife, “Babe, they got buffalo here!”
He prefers the word buffalo, even though he acknowledged the animals are technically bison. “I like saying buffalo, but technically they're bison. And people try to correct me and I say I know, but I like the word buffalo. My mom was from Buffalo, New York, not ‘bison’ New York. You got the Buffalo Bills, not the ‘bison’ bills. They're the Buffalo Soldiers that Bob Marley sang about, not the bison soldiers, so I like the word buffalo,” he said.
Marilyn A. Underwood's book
The ranch idea also runs through his new book, “A Soldier’s Wife: My Mother, the Marvelous Mrs. Marilyn A. Underwood,” which is available now in bookstores and online. Underwood said the book draws on his late mother Marilyn A. Underwood’s notes, comments and other material, and he has described it as a memoir centered on her life and wisdom in the face of MS.
That family thread is the friction in the story: Underwood’s rural life is not a simple lifestyle pivot, but a shared project tied to two different parental wishes. He said the family had once considered buying a ranch in Colorado Springs, then built something smaller and more practical in Utah instead.
Buffalo Boys and meat
Underwood said a Native American man named Buffalo Boys offered to pray over the bison in his care. “I met a gentleman, his name is literally Buffalo Boys, [he’s] Native American. And, you know, the regard and the respect and the reverence they have for the bison is critical. And I kind of come from that same space, that mindset,” he said.
He also said the animals are processed for meat. “It's just a respect for them that, you know, they're giving their body and their life and themselves for the sustenance of us as human beings. So I want to respect that,” he said. That leaves the clearest reading of the story: Underwood is not dabbling in a hobby farm, but carrying a family ranch ambition into a working setup that already has a practical end use.
