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EDDY AKRIDGE |
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| Courage and determination helped earn Eddy Akridge his fourth world bareback riding championship. The cowboy, born Jan. 8, 1929, in Pampa, Texas, had rolled to three consecutive world titles in the early 1950s before suffering a potentially career-ending knee injury. Ignoring his doctors’ advice to quit rodeo, he went on to have his best season ever. Akridge later reinjured his knee and was forced to retire. At the same time, he gave up his seat as bareback riding director on the PRCA Board of Directors. He wore a heavy brace for two years. But in 1959, Akridge decided to pursue a fourth world title. He retired the brace, endured the pain, and in 1961 captured his fourth world title. World championships: 4 (1953-55, 1961) |
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JOE ALEXANDER |
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| Joe Alexander dominated bareback riding like no other cowboy has to date. His five consecutive world titles and two regular season championships in the 1970s remain a PRCA record. Alexander, born Nov. 4, 1943, in Jackson Hole, Wyo., was a natural athlete. Ranch-raised near Cora in western Wyoming, he competed in college rodeo, winning the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association’s title in 1966. Alexander entered about 85 rodeos a year, well below the 100-plus events of most full-time contestants of his era. He set the bareback riding world record in 1974 with a 93-point ride on Beutler Brothers & Cervi’s Marlboro in Cheyenne, Wyo. This mark stood until October 2002 when Wes Stevenson rode Kesler Rodeo’s Cover Girl for 94 points during the Wrangler Tour Finale in Dallas. World Championships: 5 (1971-75) PRCA Season Championships: 2 (1976-77) |
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GUY ALLEN |
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Nicknamed “The Legend” by his peers, Guy Allen of Santa Anna, Texas, won his PRCA-record 17th world title in 2003, after sewing up the championship at the National Finals Steer Roping in Amarillo, Texas. Allen began his rodeo career at age 7, traveling with his father, James, to rodeos. By age 13, he was an accomplished steer roper. Allen joined the PRCA at 16 and filled his permit within a month. When he was just 19, Allen competed in the first of a record 27 NFSRs and brought home a world title. Born Sept. 5, 1958, in Chousatta, La., Allen also owns four NFSR aggregate titles and the fastest steer roping time of 7.9 seconds, set in Duncan, Okla., in 2000. “I want to be known for doing my best, for really trying hard on every turn,” Allen said. |
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WALT ALSBAUGH |
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| Rodeo was Walt Alsbaugh’s life for more than 60 years. He won the tie-down roping title in Monte Vista, Colo., when he was 13, and again 22 years later. During those years he competed in every event except bareback riding. Walt Alsbaugh Rodeo began with the purchase of three professional outfits. Alsbaugh, born Nov. 15, 1918, raised 75 percent of his bucking stock. His bucking horses and bulls were selected for the National Finals Rodeo every year but one since the first NFR in 1959. Alsbaugh, 1986 PRCA Stock Contractor of the Year, also provided stock for a number of Western county fairs, high school, college and all-Indian rodeos. He was the Turquoise Circuit Stock Contractor of the Year three times. “If there is such a thing as a hereafter, I’d want to be a bucking horse. You eat your grain, buck and eat your grain,” said Alsbaugh, who died Sept. 24, 1992. | ||
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JIM BOB ALTIZER |
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Jim Bob Altizer started his rodeo career at a young age and won numerous junior rodeo titles before embarking on his stellar professional career. Regarded as one of rodeo’s greatest steer ropers, Altizer also excelled in tie-down roping, winning a world title in that event at the first NFR in 1959. He went on to win a world steer roping title in 1967. But the cowboy, born May 5, 1932, in Del Rio, Texas, never forgot the start that junior rodeo gave him. For years he conducted free roping schools and clinics on his ranch near Del Rio for youngsters. He was an outstanding contributor of rodeo at all levels. He died in 1997. |
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GENE AUTRY |
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| Sports fans knew Gene Autry as the owner of the California (now Anaheim) Angels baseball team and the former Western movie and singing star who once played semi-pro baseball. But few are aware of his longtime involvement in professional rodeo. In 1942 Autry, at the height of his screen popularity, had a string of rodeo stock based in Ardmore, Okla. A year later he became a partner in the World Championship Rodeo Company, which furnished stock for many of the country’s major rodeos. In 1954 he acquired Montana’s top bucking string from the estate of Leo J. Cremer, Sr. and put Canadian saddle bronc riding champion Harry Knight in charge of the operation. A merger with the World Championship Rodeo Company in 1956 made Autry the sole owner. He moved the entire company to a 24,000-acre ranch near Fowler, Colo., with Knight as the working partner in the operation. For the next 12 years they provided stock for most of the major rodeos in Texas, Colorado, Montana and Nebraska. When the company was sold in 1968, both men continued to be active in rodeo. Autry died Oct. 2, 1998. | ||
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