Out of The Hat

Written By Gene Pruitt

Editor of “The Rodeo Sports News”

 

Now that Leo Moomaw has retired from the rodeo business put me to thinking about the days when I first started going to rodeos up there in northern Washington where he lived. 

            One of the outstanding events it was ever my pleasure to watch was right up there the Keller rodeo, before the Grand Coulee Dam backed the Columbia river up over the old rodeo grounds. They had a deal called the Mountain Race that was the most outlandish thing to watch since the Civil War.  

            Right back of the arena was a great high mountain covered with rocks, pine trees, and shale slides. I don’t know how high it was for sure but when you wanted to look up at the top of it, the best way was to lay down. Well they’d all ride clear to the top of this mountain while the rodeo was going on and about the time the bull riding was over they’d be all set for the race.

            There’d be perhaps fifty entries and some of them carrying a pretty fair cargo of strong whiskey and all of them would bunch up at the back of a little bench near the top. When the starter fired his pistol they’d all take off on a dead run for the edge of the rim and when all those horses cam busting over the edge it was a site to watch. The idea of this race was to see who could be first into the arena and generally speaking every on of them rode like the law was after them. 

            Just about a fourth of the way down the mountain there was a little rim rock, a shale slide and a patch of small pine trees. When those running horses hit that place it looked like nothing you’ll ever see in the movies. There would be horses, cowboys and Indians scattered all the way to the bottom and many times only two or three men would reach the bottom right side up. 

 

            One year this same Leo Moomaw had traded for a fine new saddle horse and decided he would enter the Mountain Race. He made a fine run too, came into the arena first, which proves one thing, he wasn’t afraid of anything on earth.

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This was taken from a column called Out of the Hat. It was written by Gene Pruitt for the Rodeo Sports News. Gene was the 1948 world champion bronk rider. He was born and raised in the state of Washington near Yakima and lived at Soap Lake during much of his bronk riding days..