Legend Lost: Larry Mahan Was

BY KENDRA SANTOS Courtesy: Tetonridgeplus.com

Larry Mahan did a whole lot of living before heading to Heaven early this morning. His cowboy friends called him Bull, and he did a whole lot of winning in his legendary lifetime, too—both in and out of the arena. Mahan first struck gold as the 1965 world champion bull rider, and won a second gold bull riding buckle in 1967. The three-event roughstock-riding sensation won five straight world allaround titles from 1966-70, and a sixth world all-around crown in 1973. Mahan was a cowboy pilot, who flew himself and cowboy friends coast to coast—and beyond. Mahan was a businessman and an entrepreneur with a flair for fashion, with Larry Mahan Collections and popular lines of boots, hats and clothing he designed himself. Mahan was a pioneer at supplementing in-arena income with sponsorship money, long before patched-up competition shirts were the norm, like they are now.

Mahan was The Man. He owned his era, and went out of his road to answer the call of both Western and mainstream media, which helped elevate the cowboy sport to where it is today. Inducted with the inaugural Class of 1979 at the ProRodeo Hall of Fame, Mahan returned to center stage as the 2010 Legend of Pro Rodeo at the Hall’s Gala held each year in Vegas leading up to our cowboy sport’s Super Bowl. As a human, Mahan was generous of spirit. He always took the time to talk to me—and countless others—and never cut our time short. He opened every conversation with me by asking about my cowboyhorse-doctor dad, complimenting him as someone he always admired and respected at the other end of the arena and asking that I, “Give Dad my best.”

I have memories of Mahan from back when I was a little girl. But our professional lives passed—a lot and often—over Ty Murray. I got to witness Mahan being the first to shake Murray’s hand when Ty accomplished his lifelong dream of breaking Mahan’s record with his seventh world all-around championship in 1998. Fitting that Ty was one of the last people to spend time with Mahan these last few days, when his earthly end was very near. The trailblazer and the kid who proudly took his torch and carried it to even greater heights had two precious, priceless hours together in Mahan’s Texas home. Just the two of them. One last time. I don’t see Ty around all the time now, like I did in the day when he was busy ruling the rodeo world. Sure special and appreciated that he knew how much it would mean to me to hear from him at the close of that final goodbye to his hero, mentor and friend. The last call like this one was the day Jim Shoulders died. Ty was the first to tell me. Mahan lived on the wild side, and was always a little bit unusual— a non-conformist in the most complimentary sense of the word. “If you think back to his era, everybody dressed alike,” Ty said. “Larry came along, and he loved to ride. But he didn’t look, act, ride, walk or talk like anybody else. He had an open mind that nobody else had. He looked at things differently. “Mahan’s love and passion for the challenge of riding bucking stock has to be the greatest factor in why he was so successful in the arena. And he was far and away the most successful outside the arena, too.”

Their bond and 40-plus-year friendship had the humblest of beginnings. Larry first laid eyes on 12-year-old Ty, and recognized a special “it” factor in the scrappy, skinny kid from Arizona. (Years later, Larry told Ty that at first sight, he saw a 12-year-old kid who rode better than he did.) Mahan told Ty’s dad, Butch Murray, to bring Ty out to see him. Butch figured Mahan was just saying that to be nice, but didn’t think he really meant it. But he did. Larry reached out to Butch again, “No, really. Bring him.”

Butch took Ty to see Larry, who put the kid on a cutting horse with his bronc saddle straight out of the blocks. A couple days later, Mahan invited Ty to spend the summer he was 13 at Larry’s ranch in Guffey, Colorado. While it’s easy for me to see Ty’s softspoken,