Old hands, young riders saddle up for Phillips Rodeo
TONY BROWN/DAILY FORUM
A roper bears down on a fleeing calf during the Ed Phillips Memorial Rodeo, which celebrated its 23rd year Saturday at the Ed Phillips Memorial Arena in Maryville.
For cowboys and cowgirls across at least four states, the Ed Phillips Memorial Arena on the northwest edge of Maryville was the place to be on Saturday.
Having now completed its 23rd year, the Ed Phillips Memorial Rodeo commemorates the late manager of the former Energizer battery plant. Phillips, a past president of the Missouri Quarter Horse Association, died in 1995.
But his love of western-style riding lives on in an event that has become a late-summer tradition for rodeo fans across the region.
Horse folks are a unique and diverse breed, and the barrel racers, ropers, bulldoggers, bronc busters and bull riders competing at this year’s event came from all walks of life.
There was, for example, Lisa Luther, a barrel racer from Fontanelle, Iowa, who in her other life teaches high school math.
“I’ve just always loved horses,” said Luther, who raced as a teenager and then left the sport for 25 years, returning a few years ago after her husband died.
“I don’t know,” she said of her affection for the rodeo ring. “I just love to go fast.”
Another rider in town over the weekend was Bill Huber, who ranches near Albia, a small town in south central Iowa.
Huber, a calf roper, was one of a number of riders at the Phillips Rodeo who more or less make a living in the saddle. Now 54, he started rodeoing at age 5. These days, he’s slacked off a little, and is spending more time managing his family-owned cattle operation.
“I’ve done it my whole life,” Huber said, adding that earning prize money in the rodeo ring requires dedication and — most importantly — a good horse.
“It takes a lot of time and a good-bred horse,” he said. “You’re lucky when you get one, and they’re not easy to find.”
These days, Huber hits the rodeo trail with his youngest son, Cody, a roper like his dad. His other son, Justin, coaches the Albia High School football team.
In years past, Huber competed in up to 100 rodeos a year, rolling through a grueling schedule that stretched from January to November. These days he’s cut back to around 40 or so events, with Cody, who like his dad has turned pro, often hitting the road alone.
“When I was going full time, I wasn’t around home hardly at all,” said Huber, who traveled with his young family as often as possible. “It’s what my wife and I raised the kids at.”
At the other end of the experience spectrum Saturday was Reed Boos, a broad-shouldered, tanned and boyishly handsome 16 year old from White Cloud, Kansas.
Like Huber, Boos grew up in the saddle and competes in rodeos across the region as a calf and team roper.
“I practice every day,” said Boos, though admitting to throttling back his saddle time to a couple of times a week in the dead of winter.
“It takes a lot of work,” he said.
Built like a running back, Boos is obviously an athlete, but rodeo is his only sport.
“I haven’t got time for nothin’ else,” he said.
And as for girls, well, for the time being he’s just riding off into the sunset.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t pay much attention to them — or I try not to.”
TONY BROWN/DAILY FORUM
Barrel racer Lisa Luther, who in her other life teaches mathematics in Fontanelle, Iowa, strikes a pose with two of her best friends during Saturday’s Ed Phillips Memorial Rodeo.
TONY BROWN/DAILY FORUM
A pair of bulldoggers chase a steer Saturday afternoon during the Ed Phillips Memorial Rodeo. Steer wrestling, also known as bulldogging, is an event in which a cowboy drops from his mount and wrestles a steer to the ground by grabbing its horns and forcing it into the arena dirt.
TONY BROWN/DAILY FORUM
A young wrangler looks on as two older cowboys work to separate a calf prior to a roping event at Saturday’s Ed Phillips Memorial Rodeo.
