Cattlemen's Rodeo And Arena On South Main St.

[Highrise Tower]

Woah! I found one of the first rodeos of Houston! I was browsing the newspaper The Houston Informer dated February 23, 1924 and came across a business ad for Cattlemen's Rodeo at the End of South Main Street.

This was before the Houston Fat Stock Show and Livestock Exposition in the 1930s.  I believe.

Bassett Blakely & Frank Y. Dew
Present.

Under Personal Direction Tom L. Burnett.

The Most Thrilling, Sensational, and Grueling Contests o.f Cowboy Sports Ever Staged In Texas
The Cattlemen's Rodeo.

Special Arena Seating 10,000- End of South Main Street.

You could buy the tickets at downtown's Rice Hotel.

Cattlemen's Rodeo Headquarters - Second Floor Republic Building. Phone - Preston 3327.

From what I read, Tom L. Burnett was a wealthy rodeo businessman.  A Hollywood Star.

The Houston Post dated February 25, 1924:

Others I found during the same time period.

 

Sakowitz Bros. ad.

 

[Highrise Tower]

I did some more research on the Cattlemen's Rodeo, which predates the Texas Fatstock Show/Houston Rodeo.

The Cattlmen's Rodeo was a side-show of the Democratic National Convention that Jesse H. Jones planned and developed.  Although, the timelines do not ad up?  The DNC was in 1928, and the rodeo was in 1294.

March 9, 1924

Wild Brahma steers brought to Houston for the rodeo which starts this week.

Some of the aun-fishing outlaw ponies which will give rodeo stars some bad moments.

Including a building on a South Main Street Ranch!

[Highrise Tower]

1924 Houston Rodeo:
Yakima takes a spill, Houston, Texas, 1924.

Left: Yakima winning bronc riding, Houston, Texas, 1924
Right: On Dempsy in Houston, 1924

 

[Highrise Tower]

North of 36 is a 1924 American silent Western film produced by Famous Players–Lasky and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The film is based on the novel, North of 36, by Emerson Hough. The film was directed by Irvin Willat and stars Jack Holt and Lois Wilson. This film was preserved in the Library of Congress in the 1970s and has been restored by that archive with a new screening of the restored film in the summer of 2011 in upstate New York.

The production located a herd of 4,000 long-horn cattle on a huge ranch outside of Houston, TX, at just the time when the owner, Bassett Blakeley, was ready to drive them to market. The cattle drive, which duplicated a similar event in the 1866-75 period, consisted of three covered ox-carts, thirty-two “expert cow-punchers” hired at a Houston rodeo, and an equipment and cooking crew of four. The 4,000 cattle were strung out over a distance of four miles along the old Texas-Kansas cattle trail, Gilks wrote.

 

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Very confused.  The Blakey ranch was located in Fort Bend County and Fulshear? The [1928] rodeo was located at the Houston Coliseum, and not on South Main Street.

Guess these are two different rodeos, 4 years apart. They were sponsored by the same people, which only adds to the confusion.

1928 Convention Rodeo, for the Democratic National Convention.

 

[Dave W]

I don't see any confusion here. These are two separate events held at two different locations, four years apart. Put on by some of the same people, but otherwise not connected. The 1928 event was called the Convention Rodeo, not the Cattlemen's Rodeo.

Yakima in the photos was Yakima Canutt, well known rodeo cowboy at the time who later became one of the top stuntmen of all time.