Texas

I have had so many good experiences in Fort Worth, Texas.  The first being going there with my Grandparents when I was about 20 years old, and having my grandfather re-live some of his history there.  He delivered turkeys for either Swift or Armor, but he made money bare fisted fighting (like the Clint Eastwood movie).  I think he was pretty tough.  We walked around and he told me story’s and went into the stockyards coliseum and he showed me it.

[My Dad, My Grandpa, and my Uncle.  A tough bunch]

I never dreamed I would come back and have lots of things happen in that historic building and town.  I got to start colts and work cattle several times, and watched both my Son Rial and Daughter Mesa compete in events.

Mesa ran barrels and roped, and bucked lots of bulls in the arena at the weekly rodeo.  Rial rode ranch broncs.  I am so glad they both got the experience.

The first event I did in the arena was a event called Hero’s and Friends.  I was working with Purina and they sponsored it, so I demonstrated colt starting in the mornings, and Bob Avila, Ted Robinson, and Todd Bergen were the main stars the rest of the time.  Pretty good company to keep.

Next John Lions and I did a day of demonstrations for “The Horse Industry Alliance “ and they bused thousands of school kids in for the show.  All most of those city kids wanted to do was to pet a horse.  It was at the Will Rodgers Coliseum, and it was so incredible to get to work in that great arena.

I think the next event was “The Road to the Horse (Camino del Caballo).  It was another great experience for the whole family, and as part of our home school we spent a lot of time learning about the history and spending time in the old cattle pens.  It was a great time in our lives as a young family, and even though I didn’t win it is a real good memory and I’m real proud I didn’t compromise my horsemanship just to try to win a contest.  I do remember I did a roping and cattlehandling demo with my dogs and it was really a good one.  I am glad our dogs Roper, Lasso and Johnny Cash got to work in Cowtown.  They really did good.

I might have the order messed up, but the next thing I did was the “Tom Dorrance Benefit”.  It was back at the  John Justin arena at Will Rogers.  It was another great experience that I felt real good about how I got by my colt, and I was very proud to get to be the auctioneer at the benefit auction.  It was really the only time I really interacted with Ray Hunt, and he was running the show and I was selling.  We sold the heck out of things!

I’m going to skip ahead a couple of events and stay with the benefit theme.  We have had a friend and partner in the horse world for many years.  Michael Richardson is a great inspiration and Horseman.  He’s been in a wheel chair for lots of years and does great at helping people with their horses.  He had some real bad luck with injuries and spider bites and all kinds of stuff.  A bunch of us got together and did demonstrations in the stockyards coliseum and raised some money to help him out.  It was good friends helping a good friend that would of done the same for us.  It was a real special time, and It changed my opinions on some of the folks that were a part of it.

The next event was a real life changer.  I had been trying to do more cattle handling demos.  Charlie Trayer and I did some together for Ernie Rodina and I knew they had value, but it was mostly the horse crowd that was watching and they enjoyed them but it was more entertainment.

I was contacted by a fellow named Todd McCartney with the Texas and Southwest Cattleraisers Association.  He wanted to do a live cattlehandling demo for the convention.  It ended up I did the horseback portion, Joel Hamm did the on foot work, and Charlie Trayer did a cattlehandling with dogs.

It went real good, and Rene Loyd with the NCBA was watching and asked if we would all be willing to do it at the National Convention in Denver.  We did and it was very well received and the Stockmanship and Stewardship program was born.  Cattle handling demonstrations have been a part of every national convention since, and I don’t know how many demos I’ve done demonstrating cattlehandling around North America, but it has been a bunch, and it all got started because of Todd and the “gigg” in Fort Worth.

It’s real fun to be working cattle horseback in downtown Reno, or Tampa, or even New Orleans in front of some of the real progressive cattle producers in the country.

I been back to the TSCRA convention three times doing demos.  They have been in the convention center in downtown FW.  My now very good friend Todd McCartney, brought me his son “Young Ben”(think Lonesome Dove) very nice horse so it was easy for me to be in the right place at the right time. 

Everything worked great, We got to see lots of old friends and make some new ones, and my kinfolk from Coleman, Texas, Chris and Cindy Jamison spent some time with us, and I even got time to go down to the Stockyards and share some Ideas with the Fort Worth Herd Drovers,(I so much believe in and admire what they do).  To top it all off we went and had breakfast at Esperanzas, my favorite place to eat breakfast in the world.

So it was a great way to finish up my last big run I told you about.  I hope it’s not the last time I get to work in “Cowtown”, and who knows maybe I can take my Grandson “Neo” and show him around when he gets to where he would appreciate it.  Maybe his dad will help him on a Bronc in there some day.

I’m glad I ran out of time on my last loop thrown.  It gave me time to reflect back a little more on the past twenty years.  

One day in Madison, Wisconsin at the Mid-West horse fair a fellow came up and visited me while I was eating lunch in the stands.  He told me he was getting on the Amtrak train in the morning and taking a few days to get to the west coast, I think it was Seattle, Washington.  When I asked him what for, he told me to get a hamburger.

I laughed and told him I’d buy him one right here, as I was eating one.  He said it wasn’t about the hamburger, but the journey.  

Well, I have been on one heck of a ride for the last twenty years and it’s been a great journey.  

All the great times working in Sweden, the horse fairs, the clinics, and miles of travel have been the greatest.  The people I have worked for/with have been the real deal, and a real bunch of characters.

From the movie stars and celebrities on the Horse Whisperer, my old friend Sven from Sweden, who really helped me transition from a hick cowboy to being able to get along anywhere.  Darrell Burnett that really saw value in what we were doing and got us paid for it, and then showed me how to spend it on good music, food and having a good time.  All the beef folks that I have worked with in the past few years making sure that fellow making the trip had a good burger.

The folks that have been the conductors on the train I’ve been riding have allowed me to see so many things, meet so many good people, and work with so many great animals.  

Wife Tammy was pretty emotional on our recent trip.  That’s understandable as she cries when someone wins on the “Wheel of Fortune”.  She has been a big part of the journey.  

I didn’t get emotional or really even think about it as I was to busy doing what I had to do.  I am just glad it all came together like it did, and I got to see who I got to see and do what I got to do, and I’m not talking about last week, but the whole ride.  I’m still not eating my hamburger, I’m just getting on another train.

I guess contentment from good memories and the endorphin release you get from those memories is emotion, so if you happened to be a part of my little train ride, thanks for the memories!

I am so glad that fellow interrupted my lunch and told me the train story.  I really think it was one of those moments in life that changed the way I looked at things and really added to my quality of life.  I hope sharing the story does the same for you.

The next loop I throw is going to be about our days in Texas and that may be a big loop!

What a great Trip on my last big run of work(if you can call it that).

I could not have picked and scripted it any better.  Most everything I have done in the past twenty years was represented in the last ten days.

It started in Tulare, California with the NCBA’s first dairy based stockmanship and Stewardship program.  I have worked with lots of dairy cattle and producers in the past years and enjoy them both, admire the level of professionalism of the dairy industry, and really believe cattlehandling can have a very positive impact on dairy production.

I got to work with my long time friend and presenter Ron Gill, and the California Beef council has always been great to work for.  Jill Scofield lights up the room (maybe the whole state)with her passion for promoting all things Beef.  My very good friend Bill Dale, head of the California Beef Council was there and as a real bonus, his Daughter Kendall came with him and it was so much fun seeing our little girl has grown up to be a very fun and beautiful young lady.

Got on a plane in Fresno and arrived in Springfield, Missouri about midnight.  I’ve been to Ozark fairgrounds before at horse fairs and farm shows.  I’ve been going to and demonstrating at these things for well over twenty years.  I’ve seen lots of things and met lots of people at em.  Purina and Priefert were at lots of them, and in Springfield I was in a Priefert roundpen, and Ernie Rodena of Purina fame was there just like old times.

When I was in the prime of the colt starting demo days there were lots of weeks I’d be demonstrating starting five or more colts a week.  It was a great time in my life.  I love taking a colt and making real nice changes in a couple hours that will effect the horse the rest of his life.  It was so much like riding bucking horses when I was rodeoing. You didn’t know what you might be getting on and what might happen.  I was never scared to throw my leg over anything.  Probably lucky I survived it with no injuries.

I got to start a colt in Springfield.  He was a four year old roan gelding that had been handled just right.  My first demo was in the big arena, and I had Mike Burris help me on his saddle horse.  I got him saddled pretty easy and when I turned him loose he bucked pretty good and moved out pretty fast with the saddle.  

I got him ready to get on and had Mike go in front and we got him carrying my weight and moving out without getting to bothered.  It was a real good first ride and I’m glad I didn’t have to start him in the round pen.  The next three sessions were in the round pen and then I used him for my last cattle handling session in the arena.  

I had so much fun and felt real good about how the colt turned out, and how I used the colt starting to help folks understand horsemanship and cattle handling.  I am so glad I got to do it on the last big run as so much of the past twenty years was spent putting the first ride on a horse.

I was very fortunate to end up right in the middle of the biggest horse “bubble” ever.  It was so amazing for a guy like me that grew up only seeing ranch type horses and rodeo horses, to witness all the different ways people use horses.  

To be a part of all of it and to get to do a book with Western Horseman, videos and demonstrations with the American Quarter Horse association and work for great company’s like Purina and Priefert, was something I never would have imagined.  

In all honesty I don’t think it would have happened if it wasn’t for Buck Brannaman and him getting me involved with the “Horse Whisperer” movie.

I saw so many people thinking they wanted to be in the world of the horse, and I saw a lot of extreme things that maybe didn’t fit the horse or the people.  When the bubble burst no one saw it coming and it really changed things.  I think it is much better as I don’t see all the hype and extremes like it was when there was so much money everyone was out there trying to grab.  Horses and people are better off when common sense and true knowledge is the driver rather than money and ego.

Wife Tammy flew in to Springfield on Sunday afternoon and we got to have supper and spend time with our old friend and partner Michael Richardson.

He was doing demos as well and I watched when I could and he was as amazing to me as ever.  If you get to feeling sorry for your self, go spend a day with Michael and try to stay in his wheel tracks.  He has more try and heart that anyone I know.

Monday morning we went to Agape Boarding School in Stockton, Missouri.  I went last year and rode for the Brothers and with the boys.  Greatest experience ever and we had a day so I wanted to spend some time.  Of course Tammy fell in love with all of these great kids and wanted to take them all home with us.  All I know is horses and cows are much better than drugs and abuse and with the guidance of some great people these boys are getting the chance to be and live cowboy and learn that in the world of horses and cows they don’t lie and they don’t cheat and they don’t judge, but give back what you give them.  I love the place, the boys and the people that are dedicated to helping them.  

They are having a horse sale June 15 that the boys sell the horse they have worked with.  Look it up online.  If you can come see what “Agape” means and is all about.

 Next stop, a couple hours up the road we met a group at the “Square B” ranch.

Eric Grant is a fellow that I have been working with and learning from for several years.  We worked on video projects for the National Cattleman’s Beef Association, and when he worked for Angus we did several TV episodes.  When Eric quit working for Angus we had supper one night and he said he had ideas and wanted me to be a part of them.  I didn’t ask what they were or what he wanted, I just said I was in for anything he wanted me to be a part of.

[Erics Work]

They have put together a very talented bunch of people and we went and visited with some of them sharing ideas.  I still don’t know and don’t care what he has in mind, but I’m in.  It was a fun day and we might have seen one of the  nicest, well run ranches in the country.  Stay tuned.

We then headed to Olathe, Kansas and had supper with the Trabon Family.  Tim Trabon was one of my real good friends and he left us a few years ago.  I have really enjoyed seeing how they went on and are moving forward and doing things better than Tim ever did.  He would be very proud of all of them.  It was so much fun laughing and telling stories, and to hearing the things they have done and are going to get done.  Patti keeps it all together as she always has.

Tim and I were pulling into his driveway one night and it was a tight fit with his truck and trailer.  Patti had moved the garbage bins to the other side of the road knowing we would be pulling in.  Tim made me aware of how smart and observant his wife was and he really appreciated her.  Great family.

[Tim Trabon and John Ballweg]

Of course we didn’t want to leave so we ended up not getting to Salina, Kansas until midnight and then I had to work pretty early the next morning.  We were at the  Mid America farm show and I did a horsemanship demo in the morning and a cattlehandling demo in the afternoon.  I’ve been there a few years in a row so I know some and met some knew people.  I was tired and a little off so I didn’t work the cattle as well as I could have, and was a little disappointed in that, but felt good about the way I presented to the folks in attendance.

Headed south for six hours and got to McAlester, Oklahoma about nine that night.  We set up a portable tub system and some panels at 8 AM and was presenting to the crowd by about 9:15.  It was the OSU cow calf producers “Bootcamp”.  We had a fun little bunch of calves to work and I had fun presenting to the real receptive cattle and crowd.  I felt much better about how I worked the cattle than the day before.

I am writing this recap on my flights home to Bozeman, Montana.  We just landed so I am going to wrap this part up.  United Airlines added to my positive experience by giving me an upgrade to first class from Denver to Bozeman!

When I get caught up I’ll tell you about my experience in Fort Worth, Texas and give you some thoughts on the last twenty plus years working in the greatest industry with the very special people and animals I have come in contact with.

I am so exited to get moved and to work on my knew challenge, running a great ranch.