Ranchers Said John Wayne Couldn't Rope a Steer at 55 — He Asked for One Chance

Nogales, Arizona, 1963. John Wayne had been practicing roping since 1958. Twice a week, on his property in Encino, on a patient rope horse his trainer had found, throwing at a practice dummy made from pipe and canvas. Five years. Nobody knew about it. He had never roped in front of anyone who knew what roping was. He was in Nogales for a film location scout when Curtis Sloane, secretary of the Nogales Livestock Association, stopped him at the fence rail during the morning's working exhibition. One competitor had pulled out with a bad shoulder. There was an open slot in the roping event. Three ranchers in the front row of the bleachers had been watching. One of them — Frank Orosco, sixty-three years old, running cattle since 1938 — said, at a volume that carried to the fence rail, that an actor throwing rope at a dummy in a Los Angeles backyard was going to have a different experience with a live steer. John Wayne heard it. He said he appreciated the observation. Then he said he'd take the slot. They gave him a horse named Cobre. He had twenty-two minutes. He spent twelve of them with the horse. The steer came out of the chute at nine forty-seven and cut left at six seconds. Cobre cut with it. Wayne threw on the second swing. Nine point four seconds. Fourth out of seven. Frank Orosco looked at the arena for a long moment. Then he said, at a volume that no longer carried to the fence rail, that he'd been wrong about the backyard.