Tornado was a
bucking bull
A bucking bull is a bull used in American rodeo bull riding competition. They are usually a Brahma crossed with another breed, weighing 1,500 pounds or more, selected for their tendency to "leap, plunge and spin" when a human is on its back. C ...
who was inducted into the
ProRodeo Hall of Fame
The ProRodeo Hall of Fame and Museum of the American Cowboy was opened in August 1979 as a museum designed to "preserve the legacy of the cowboy contests, the heritage and culture of those original competitions, and the champions of the past, pr ...
and the
Bull Riding Hall of Fame
The Bull Riding Hall of Fame, located at Cowtown Coliseum in the Fort Worth Stockyards in Fort Worth, Texas, United States, is a hall of fame for the sport of bull riding. It is incorporated as a non-profit organization in the State of Texas, and ...
. He went to the
National Finals Rodeo
The National Finals Rodeo (NFR) is the premier rodeo event by the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA). The NFR showcases the talents of the PRCA's top 15 money-winners in the season for each event.
The NFR is held each year in the fi ...
(NFR) at least four times. He was voted Bucking Bull of the NFR four times consecutively from 1962 to 1965. Owned by rodeo champion
Jim Shoulders
James A. Shoulders (May 13, 1928 – June 20, 2007), also known as Jim Shoulders, was an American professional rodeo cowboy and rancher. He is commemorated at the ProRodeo Hall of Fame. At the time of his death, he was one of the most successfu ...
, Tornado was named the "meanest bull alive" at the NFR four times. Tornado is best known for his matchup with ProRodeo Hall of Fame
bull rider
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.
American bull riding has been called "the most dangerous eight seconds in sports." To recei ...
,
Freckles Brown
Warren Granger "Freckles" Brown (January 18, 1921 – March 20, 1987) was a hall of fame American rodeo cowboy from Wheatland, Wyoming. His career spanned from 1937 to 1974, competing in bull riding, saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc ri ...
, which is most often referred to as "The Ride." It was Brown who, in 1967, broke Tornado's undefeated streak of 220 buckoffs in six years. Tornado, Brown, and Shoulders all have been recorded in ''The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture'' maintained online by the
Oklahoma Historical Society
The Oklahoma Historical Society (OHS) is an agency of the government of Oklahoma dedicated to promotion and preservation of Oklahoma's history and its people by collecting, interpreting, and disseminating knowledge and artifacts of Oklahoma. ...
.
Background
Tornado was born in 1957 in Texas. The
cowboy
A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the '' vaquer ...
, bull rider and
stock contractor
A stock contractor is an individual or business that provides animals for rodeo competition. Stock contractors supply roughstock - horses for saddle bronc and bareback bronc riding (called buckjumpers in Australia) and bulls for the bull riding ...
Jim Shoulders, of
Henryetta, Oklahoma
Henryetta is a city in Okmulgee County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 5,927 at the 2010 census, down 9.6 percent from the figure of 6,096 recorded in 2000.
History
Hugh Henry established a ranch on Creek Nation land in 1885. He soon ...
, owned and managed the bull; Shoulders actually maintained several quality bucking stock, which included the other "weather" bulls Cyclone, Hurricane, and Twister.
[ According to Frank Boggs, an Oklahoman sports writer and columnist, Shoulders bought Tornado in South Texas when the bull was three years old.] Tornado was a Brahma-Hereford crossbred bull, known as a Braford that generally weighed 1,850 pounds. He is described as red with a white face. Tornado first started bucking in Mesquite, Texas
Mesquite is a suburban city located east of the city of Dallas, Texas, in the United States. Most of the city is located in Dallas County, though a small portion extends into Kaufman County. As of 2019 census estimates, the population was 140 ...
, in 1960.
Career
From Tornado's first rodeo in Mesquite, Texas, in 1960 through to the NFR in December 1967, he was undefeated, bucking off the toughest cowboys. There was a sign outside his pen at Shoulder's ranch in Henryetta: "Warning: Enter at Your Own Risk." Shoulders declared that outside of the arena Tornado was tame, and he "often walked up to Tornado in the pasture to pet him or feed him grass". However, in the arena, "Tornado transformed into a holy terror".
Tornado bucked on the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association
The Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) is the largest rodeo organization in the world. It sanctions events in the United States and Canada, with members from said countries, as well as others. Its championship event is the National F ...
(formerly the Rodeo Cowboys Association). Tornado qualified for the NFR every year from 1962 through 1966 and perhaps more. For those four years, he was the top-ranked bull on the bucking-stock list. For the first 220 attempts to ride him for a qualified ride, he remained undefeated. In addition to typical bucking abilities such as jumping, kicking, and spinning, Tornado also possessed something labeled "clown-and-barrel fighting ability." His name came from his ability to quickly alter the direction of his spin. However, he used just enough energy as he needed to buck off the level of rider on him. Another hall of fame bull, Red Rock was known for using this strategy, and he was undefeated for his entire PRCA career of 309 attempts.
Tornado was sometimes referred to as "unrideable" by the cowboys. He was finally defeated in a famous ride with Brown. Cowboy songwriter and singer Red Steagall
Russell "Red" Steagall (born December 22, 1938) is an American actor, musician, poet, and stage performer, who focuses on American Western and country music genres.
Early life and day jobs
He was born in Gainesville, Texas, United States. He ...
captured "The Ride" in his song "The Ballad of Freckles Brown." Tornado (and Brown) are now documented in the Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture maintained online by the Oklahoma Historical Society.
For four of his trips to the NFR, Tornado was voted the Bucking Bull of the NFR and named "The Meanest Bull Alive." Rodeo photographer Ferrell Butler, explained "If you didn’t get out of there, he’d camp onto you something fierce. Then he’d go wipe out the barrel." Jim Shoulders’ wife Sharon said she did not consider him vicious; she believed that he “sized up” his riders, having noticed that he bucked harder with top riders than he did for locals.
Halfway through his bucking career, in 1965, Shoulders put Tornado up for a $500 prize to anyone who could ride him at the 101 Wild West Ranch Rodeo. The offer was open to anyone, not just bull riders, as long as they were of legal age. No one won the prize. At the NFR in 1967 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, and ...
, ProRodeo Hall of Fame bull rider Myrtis Dightman
Myrtis Dightman (born 1935) is an American former professional rodeo cowboy who specialized in bull riding. He is a ProRodeo Hall of Fame inductee. Known as the "Jackie Robinson of Rodeo", Dightman was the first African-American to compete at the ...
tried to ride Tornado but failed. After "The Ride," with Freckles Brown
Warren Granger "Freckles" Brown (January 18, 1921 – March 20, 1987) was a hall of fame American rodeo cowboy from Wheatland, Wyoming. His career spanned from 1937 to 1974, competing in bull riding, saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc ri ...
, Tornado was ridden four more times, once by Brown, and also by three other riders for a total of five qualified rides. The second time Brown rode him was in Miami, Florida
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...
.
The Ride
On December 1, 1967, at the NFR in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, approximately 9,000 fans gathered in the Oklahoma State Fair Arena
Jim Norick Arena (formerly Fairgrounds Arena) is a large multi-purpose arena located at State Fair Park in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Completed in 1965 at a cost of $2.4 million, it was the largest indoor facility in Oklahoma City until the constru ...
to watch 47-year-old Freckles Brown, the 1962 PRCA World Champion Bull Rider, attempt to ride Tornado. Brown had been studying the bull’s performance at many rodeos. However, his odds of success were considered to be slim: he was older than the typical cowboy and had gotten surgery on his neck.
The two were loaded into chute #2. After they were introduced, there was a great silence in the arena. Then Tornado exploded out of the gate, and Brown's eyes were fixed on his shoulders. Butler snapped his first of two iconic photographs. One of two photographs, of which one would be lost. Tornado spun right with Brown following. "I got over there to the right," Brown recalled. "Maybe just a hair too far. I straightened up and he spun three or four times." For about four or five seconds Brown hung on. The crowd was cheering. "People were screamin' and hollerin'," Butler said. "I never heard it so loud in that place before." For a split second Brown felt worried. "I just got behind him a little bit," he said. "I throwed my foot out there, got my head back in there and did all right. You can feel it. It may not look like you were in a storm, but you can tell it when you're riding." Brown was close to making history. "I just felt real good," Brown said. "I got where I wanted to be, and that's the first time I got exactly where I wanted to be. Sometimes you don't feel that way. Sometimes out there, about the third or fourth round if they're bucking, you feel like you can ride him regardless of what he does, but not very often. It was just before the whistle when I felt like I had him rode.
Later, Brown said "the crowd was so loud that he couldn't hear the whistle. However, he knew when the clowns moved in that he had successfully ridden the bull." The chute they had used was later exhibited in the office of the Chamber of Commerce.[
Tornado was 11 years old by this time, yet he was still considered the most challenging bull. "Tornado had such a reputation that most cowboys were thrown before they even got on him," says former state senator and Oklahoma Congressman ]Clem McSpadden
Clem Rogers McSpadden (November 9, 1925 – July 7, 2008) was an American rodeo announcer and politician. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as a United States House of Representatives, U.S. Representati ...
, general manager of the NFR that year. "But the bull was at a point in its career where it was fit to be ridden. Freckles got on him, bore down and ended up riding him pretty easy".
"Radio icon Paul Harvey
Paul Harvey Aurandt (September 4, 1918 – February 28, 2009) was an American radio broadcaster for ABC News Radio. He broadcast ''News and Comment'' on mornings and mid-days on weekdays and at noon on Saturdays and also his famous ''The Rest o ...
regaled a national audience for several minutes with details of Freckles Brown's historic ride on the fearsome Tornado. The publicity did wonders for the professional rodeo circuit." Butler noticed that before "The Ride", there would be modest crowds on the weekends, saying "we couldn't get enough people in an arena to start a cussin' fight", but afterwards, he saw crowd size increase noticeably.
Retirement and death
Tornado was retired after the end of the 1968 rodeo season, to Shoulders' J Lazy S Ranch in Oklahoma. Shoulders stated that "He enjoyed his prestigious position at the ranch and made it a point to attract attention when strangers were around by bellowing and throwing dirt – almost as though he wanted all to know he was still a champion". Tornado died in spring 1972.
Shoulders died in 2007, but his wife Sharon loved to reminisce about him and Tornado, for example the cookies her two youngest daughters hand-fed Tornado while Jim was out touring. She claimed Tornado was "docile and gentle" in the pasture, and still and relaxed in the chute until it was go time. "He'd just stand there; he'd look out between the chute boards, almost like he was sizing up what he was going to do".
Tornado is buried at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum
The National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum is a museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, with more than 28,000 Western and American Indian art works and artifacts. The facility also has the world's most extensive collection of Ame ...
in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, near the graves of two notable bucking horses. Apparently 18 acres at the museum are set aside for burial memorials of notable rodeo animals. To date, there have only been four animals buried there: Tornado, two notable bucking horses (Midnight
Midnight is the transition time from one day to the next – the moment when the date changes, on the local official clock time for any particular jurisdiction. By clock time, midnight is the opposite of noon, differing from it by 12 hours. ...
and Five Minutes Til Midnight
5 is a number, numeral, and glyph.
5, five or number 5 may also refer to:
* AD 5, the fifth year of the AD era
* 5 BC, the fifth year before the AD era
Literature
* ''5'' (visual novel), a 2008 visual novel by Ram
* ''5'' (comics), an awa ...
), and the museum's Longhorn mascot, Abilene. Tornado's spot has a huge memorial plaque with a dedication. It appears on the Waymarking website.
Honors
* Has his own entry in ''The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture'' maintained online by the Oklahoma Historical Society
* The NFR entry in ''The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture'' mentions the match between Tornado and Freckles Brown
*1979 ProRodeo Hall of Fame
* 2016 Bull Riding Hall of Fame
* Voted "Bucking Bull of the NFR" at the NFR 1962-1965[''Wrangler NFR'', "Top Wrangler Bucking Stock", p. 23.]
* Named the "Meanest Bull Alive" at the NFR four times
References
Bibliography
*
External links
The Ride - National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
Tip: If there is just blank space under "The Ride" text on this page, you can still click in that space and watch the video.
Ballad of Freckles Brown - Lyrics
Tornado - Oklahoma City, OK - Animal Memorials on Waymarking.com
Videos:
Red Steagall- Freckles Brown.wmv
YouTube video of Red Steagall singing his song "Freckles Brown."
My Last Ride by Sam Hill
YouTube Video
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tornado (Bull)
1957 animal births
1972 animal deaths
Individual bulls in sport
Bucking bulls
ProRodeo Hall of Fame inductees
Bull Riding Hall of Fame inductees