 His son, Joseph W. Luter III, was at Wake Forest University at the time and joined Smithfield that year.Working in sales, he borrowed enough to buy a further eight-and-a-half percent of the shares, and in 1966 he became chairman and CEO.He told "Virginia Living" that the company was killing around 3,000 hogs a day when he took over, and 5,000 by the time he left in January 1970, while the number of employees rose from 800 to 1,400.