Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo’s “Texas Connection Series” Comes to Cowtown Coliseum
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By Andrew Giangola
On February 19, when fans stream past a large bronze statue outside the Cowtown Coliseum in Fort Worth to see the rodeo inside, they won’t be walking past any ordinary sculpture or attending any regular rodeo. The magnificent work captures the legendary cowboy Bill Pickett performing a
Photo courtesy of Andrew Giangola
rodeo discipline called “bull dogging” that he had invented. And the rodeo is named after him. By the time that Pickett had arrived at the Fort Worth Stockyards in 1905, the Texas-born cowboy had laid claim to pioneering the new rodeo discipline, which is now referred to as steer wrestling. Pickett, born to a former slave in 1870, would compete in the iconic Cowtown Coliseum, and then over the next quarter century become an international sensation performing alongside Tom Mix, Buffalo Bill, Geronimo, and Will Rogers. The native Texan would be described as “the greatest sweat and dirt cowboy that ever lived.” He would be the first Black 4
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cowboy inducted into the National Cowboy Hall of Fame. Today, the world-famous rodeo pioneer is namesake of the Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo, the all-Black nationally touring rodeo planting new roots in Texas with performances starting in February. “Bill Pickett’s arrival at the Fort Worth Stockyards was a pivotal moment in his life story,” said Keith Ryan Cartwright, author of Black Cowboys of Rodeo: Unsung Heroes from Harlem to Hollywood and the American West. “Now, almost 120 years later, it is only fitting the most significant Black rodeo, which is named in his honor, would anchor its 2022 season back in the same historical stockyards.” In addition to the Feb. 19 afternoon and evening performances, The Toyota Texas Connection Series presented by Ariat and YETI will visit Cowtown Coliseum on May 13 and 14, a Juneteenth weekend kick-off celebration on June 18, and on August 20. Tickets for these special events are available for at PBR.com or CowtownColiseum.com.
Photo courtesy of BPIR
The all-Black rodeo, run by Valeria Howard-Cunningham, was born of necessity
