RODEO, a series of contests in sports associated with, or i suggested by the routine of the American cowboy. It is an out door exhibition, customarily given annually, and in Western towns supplanting the county fair and carnival characteristic of agricul tural districts in the Middle West.
A rodeo, in the jargon of Mexican cattle-herders, is a gathering together ("round-up") of cattle, or the enclosure of a herd. Rodeo and several like Spanish words have filtered, by way of the cow boys of the South-west, into the common vocabulary of the West ern States. In the "classic" era of the American cowboy (1867 84), when the cattle of several variously-owned herds roamed over the same unfenced range, the stock was assembled semi annually at a round-up, at which the cowboys of the several ranches incidentally entertained themselves with feats of skill and informal contests, as well as with progressive poker and the drooling of ballads. From these beginnings developed rodeo, the name alike with the entertainment. The first well-advertised, well organized cowboy contest was held in Denver, Colo., in 1896. The first of the Cheyenne, Wyo., "Frontier Days" annual celebrations was held in 1897.
The Cheyenne rodeo, the Pendleton, Ore., round-up and the Calgary, Alberta, stampede are traditionally the three greatest of the annual rodeos. Victory in the more spectacular contests brings impressive trophies and cash prizes, and may secure the respectful attention of the motion-picture magnates. Belle Fourche, S.D., Las Vegas, N.M., Prescott, Ariz., Tucson, Ariz., Monte Vista, Colo., and Sumas, Wash., are among the Western towns annually staging rodeos which draw many professional rodeo-contestants as well as actual cowboys from the nearby ranches. From 1926 rodeos styled "World Series Rodeo" have been presented in New York.
The Cheyenne Frontier Days celebration of July 26-3o, 1927, which may be taken as typical of the best-organized rodeos, included in its contests a bucking-bronco riding contest, a cow girls' relay race, a two-steer roping contest, a wild horse or wild mule race, a wild-cow milking contest, a two-steer bull-dogging contest and "trick and fancy riding" contests. The bucking-horse contest (always the most important) offered the highest purse, $2,100. The Roosevelt hotel trophy, valued at $1,000, for the
"world's champion all-around cowboy," must be competed for both at Cheyenne and Calgary, and is the award of greatest prestige in rodeo. A "bull-dogging contest" is more informatively called a steer-wrestling contest. The "World Series" rules are : "Wrestler and hazer will be allowed to leave the chute with steer, and wrestler's mount and steer may be Lap-and-Tap when crossing dead line, but wrestler must not have hand on steer or leap bef ore crossing dead line. Penalty 15 seconds. . . . This is a twist-down contest—wrestler must stop steer and knock him down. If steer is knocked down, he must be let up on all four feet and thrown again, and should steer start running after once being stopped and then be thrown against the ground, the steer must be let up again and twisted down. Ten seconds fine will be added to steer wres tler's time, for knocking down steer either accidentally or pur posely"—or, as the Cheyenne rules more compactly put it, "if contestant hooligans steer, any question as to cleanness of throw and fall will be left entirely to the judges." Incidentally, "bull dogging" was literally performed at the Cheyenne rodeo of when a negro from Texas sank his teeth into the steer's upper lip, and, without using his hands, twisted the steer to the ground. Charles B. Cochran, the Lon don theatrical producer, hired 150 American cowboys to compete with others from Canada, the Argentine and Australia in an in ternational rodeo at the British Empire exhibition of 1924. Most unfortunately, a steer's leg was broken in the course of the first evening's performance. Many of the audience of 40,000 hissed and booed, and the Royal Society f or the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals initiated legal processes.
When the defendants appeared before the magistrate in Hendon, they wore their full ornate re galia, each man "packing" a gun. The summonses were dismissed; but the prince of Wales was deterred from accepting the gift of a cow-pony, and the impression that rodeos involved cruelty to the cattle and horses has not been wholly dissipated. It is com paratively untrue and is a very small handicap to a sport firmly rooted in the American West. (E. D. BR.)