The Angola Prison Rodeo, staged at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, is the longest running prison rodeo in the United States.
It is held on one weekend in April and on every Sunday in October. On each occasion, thousands of visitors enter the prison complex. [1] Various prisoner organizations sell food at concession stands. Many of the prisoners use family recipes to craft the concession stand food. Prison guards conduct the financial transactions at the Angola Rodeo. [2]
As part of the prison rodeo, [3] there is a biannual Arts and Crafts Festival. Prisoners make handmade work. Melissa Schrift, author of Angola Prison Art: Captivity, Creativity, and Consumerism, wrote that "In addition to introducing innovations into vernacular prison art forms, Angola inmates find enormous value in creating works that embody or mimic the everyday images and goods so readily available in the outside world." [4]
The rodeo raises funds for religious educational programs for prisoners. As of 2013 each spring rodeo raises $450,000. [3] The rodeo's slogan is "the wildest show in the South". [3]
The idea of the rodeo was born in 1964. [2] The Rodeo, a collaboration between prisoners and prison employees, began in 1965. [5] Cathy Fontenot, the Assistant Warden, said that originally prisoners and staff backed pickup trucks into a field "and would go out there and play around on horses." [2] Both horses and cattle are bred and raised at the prison. The horses are used by trustees to supervise field work, and the cattle are raised for sale as beef.
In 1967 LSP opened the Rodeo to outside spectators. Over the years, LSP erected bleachers and adopted the rules of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association. In addition the administration added an Arts and Crafts festival, and added stock animals and rodeo clowns. The current 10,000-person stadium opened in 2000. [5]
Inmate Jack Favor, a former rodeo star from Texas, worked to establish the rodeo. He was wrongly convicted of two murders in Bossier Parish and sentenced to life at Angola. He sought to instill self-discipline in the prisoners and formed a chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Prison authorities permitted Favor to travel across the state to promote the event. Favor earmarked funds raised through the rodeo to finance emergency trips for inmates, under guard. [6] [7]
The rodeo is still operating [8] and is the oldest prison rodeo in the United States;[ citation needed ] the Texas Prison Rodeo started in 1931 but was closed in 1986.
The prison rodeo went on hiatus in 2020.
Some criticize the event for being inhumane and exploitative. For example, in 2013, the LSU Reveille published a piece calling the rodeo "reminiscent of the Roman gladiators (read: glorified slaves)" and "barbaric at best." [9] Several events are specifically designed to endanger the lives of participating inmates, like the especially dangerous convict poker, where a bull is released with the sole purpose of unseating poker players, and the players must resist the urge to run away in order to win.
Some measures, like helmets, mouth guards, and vests, have been put in place to prevent serious injury. But injuries are still common, in part due to the fact that inmates receive no training before they participate. [10]
While the event is voluntary and many inmates speak its praises, the chance to win cash prizes of up to $500 (in the case of the Guts & Glory event) is a strong economic incentive for inmates to put themselves in harm's way, especially since inmates' wages usually earn them between $0.02 and $0.75 an hour. Critics say the prize money compromises the voluntary nature of the event. [11] [10]
In 2017, the Angola rodeo's bank records for the last 10 years were audited following an earlier audit that showed mishandling. [12]
An earlier audit found that $6.2 million in revenue from the rodeo in 2014 and 2015 was being kept in a private checking account instead of the Louisiana Department of Treasury. After this discovery, investigators realized that the rodeo's revenue had never been monitored by the state government since it began. The audit also discovered that funds had been improperly used to order a prison bus, and that $28,000 in concession sales between 2010 and 2015 had gone missing. [12]
Rodeo is a competitive equestrian sport that arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain and Mexico, expanding throughout the Americas and to other nations. It was originally based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States, western Canada, and northern Mexico. Today, it is a sporting event that involves horses and other livestock, designed to test the skill and speed of the cowboys and cowgirls. American-style professional rodeos generally comprise the following events: tie-down roping, team roping, steer wrestling, Steer roping, saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc riding, bull riding and barrel racing. The events are divided into two basic categories: the rough stock events and the timed events. Depending on sanctioning organization and region, other events such as breakaway roping, goat tying, and pole bending may also be a part of some rodeos. The "world's first public cowboy contest" was held on July 4, 1883, in Pecos, Texas, between cattle driver Trav Windham and roper Morg Livingston.
Bull riding is a rodeo sport that involves a rider getting on a bucking bull and attempting to stay mounted while the animal tries to buck off the rider.
Bronc riding, either bareback bronc or saddle bronc competition, is a rodeo event that involves a rodeo participant riding a bucking horse that attempts to throw or buck off the rider. Originally based on the necessary buck breaking skills of a working cowboy, the event is now a highly stylized competition that utilizes horses that often are specially bred for strength, agility, and bucking ability. It is recognized by the main rodeo organizations such as the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) and the International Professional Rodeo Association (IPRA).
Steer wrestling, also known as bulldogging, is a rodeo event in which a horse-mounted rider chases a steer, drops from the horse to the steer, then wrestles the steer to the ground by grabbing its horns and pulling it off-balance so that it falls to the ground. The event carries a high risk of injury to the cowboy. Some concerns from the animal-rights community express that the competition may include practices that constitute cruelty to animals, but the injury rate to animals is less than 0.05%. A later PRCA survey of 60,971 animal performances at 198 rodeo performances and 73 sections of "slack" indicated 27 animals were injured, again around 0.05%.
Calf roping, also known as tie-down roping, is a rodeo event that features a calf and a rider mounted on a horse. The goal of this timed event is for the rider to catch the calf by throwing a loop of rope from a lariat around its neck, dismount from the horse, run to the calf, and restrain it by tying three legs together, in as short a time as possible. A variant on the sport, with fewer animal welfare controversies, is breakaway roping, where the calf is roped, but not tied.
The Louisiana State Penitentiary is a maximum-security prison farm in Louisiana operated by the Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections. It is named "Angola" after the former slave plantation that occupied this territory. The plantation was named after the country of Angola, from which many enslaved people originated before arriving in Louisiana.
Rodeos have long been a popular competitor and spectator sport in Australia, but were not run on an organised basis until the 1880s.
The National High School Rodeo Association (NHSRA), based in Denver, Colorado, was incorporated in 1961 to promote interest in rodeo sports among high school students, to provide training, and to establish venues for their performances.
Mutton busting is an event held at rodeos similar to bull riding or bronc riding, in which children ride or race sheep.
The National Finals Rodeo (NFR) is the premier championship rodeo of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA). It showcases the talents of the PRCA's top 15 money winners in the season for each event.
The Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) is the largest rodeo organization in the world. It sanctions events in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, with members from said countries, as well as others. Its championship event is the National Finals Rodeo (NFR). The PRCA is headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States.
Cheyenne Frontier Days is an outdoor rodeo and western celebration in the United States, held annually since 1897 in Cheyenne, Wyoming. It bills itself as the "World's Largest Outdoor Rodeo and Western Celebration." The event, claimed to be one of the largest of its kind in the world, draws nearly 200,000 annually. Lodging fills up quickly during the peak tourist season throughout southern and eastern Wyoming, into northern Colorado and western Nebraska. The celebration is held during the ten days centered about the last full week of July. In 2008, Cheyenne Frontier Days was inducted into the ProRodeo Hall of Fame.
Earl Wesley Bascom was an American-Canadian painter, printmaker, sculptor, cowboy, rodeo performer, inventor, and Hollywood actor. Raised in Canada, he portrayed in works of fine art his own experiences of cowboying and rodeoing across the American and Canadian West. Bascom was awarded the Pioneer Award by the ProRodeo Hall of Fame in 2016 and inducted into several halls of fame including the Canadian Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame in 1984. Bascom was called the "Cowboy of Cowboy Artists," the "Dean of Rodeo Cowboy Sculpture" and the "Father of Modern Rodeo." He was a participant member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Ty Monroe Murray, is an American former professional rodeo cowboy. He competed in the three "roughstock" events; bareback bronc riding, saddle bronc riding, and bull riding. He won nine world championships in the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA); seven in all-around and two in bull riding. He was also one of the co-founders and a board adviser of the Professional Bull Riders (PBR). From 2005 to 2020, he was also a regular color commentator for several televised PBR events.
The Raymond Stampede is an annual rodeo held in the town of Raymond, Alberta, Canada on July 1. It is recognized as Alberta's oldest rodeo and Canada's oldest professional rodeo, predating the famous Calgary Stampede by ten years.
The Texas Prison Rodeo was a rodeo and an annual celebration event for inmates in the Texas Prison System, held in a stadium in Huntsville, Texas. The stadium was located at the Huntsville Unit. The events included bareback basketball, bronco riding, bull riding, calf roping, and wild cow milking.
A stock contractor is an individual or business that provides animals for rodeo competition. Stock contractors supply rough stock - bucking horses for saddle bronc and bareback bronc riding and bucking bulls for bull riding, plus steers for steer wrestling and team roping, plus calves for calf roping and breakaway roping events. The use of stock contractors who specialize in providing these animals has produced a more uniform range of bucking stock which is also quieter to handle.
The Heart of the North Rodeo is located in Spooner, Wisconsin, United States. The rodeo takes place the first full weekend in July every year since 1954, except 2020. It is sanctioned by the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA). Fans from all over come to watch the professional cowboys and cowgirls compete in the seven main events of rodeo, and even some up-and-coming little cowboys and cowgirls.
A bucking horse is any breed of horse, male or female, with a propensity to buck. They have been, and still are, referred to by various names, including bronco, broncho, and roughstock.
Grated Coconut #G-65 (1997–2024) was a Canadian rodeo bucking horse that was specialized in bareback bronc riding. He was a six-time Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) Bareback Horse of the Year. He was also a six-time Canadian Professional Rodeo Association (CPRA) Bareback Horse of the Year from. He was inducted into three halls of fame, including the ProRodeo Hall of Fame of the PRCA, the Canadian Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame of the CPRA, and the Ellensburg Rodeo Hall of Fame of the PRCA-sanctioned Ellensburg Rodeo.