Western communities, many from their earliest beginnings, celebrated our nation’s Independence Day in their own way, with picnics, music, foot races, buckin’ horses and horse races and food. The annual celebration has always been about flying the flag proudly when they exhibited it both indoor and outdoors. The main modes of transportation of each era continued to be festooned with the ol’ red, white and blue decorations befitting such an occasion.
Most of the families in the White River Valley participated in horse races, picnics, and a few games for the children. The dances would usually be held out on one family’s ranch or in their barn, later often in numerous one-room schoolhouses that dotted the countryside.
Pioneer Anna Peaslee’s oral history interview dating back to her families life here told he favorite memories of all of the special day’s celebrations in 1914. “Our Fourth of July celebrations were great. We had races, games, a lot to eat and then finished by going to the schoolhouse for a dance and more eats. Ben Jacobs sometimes furnished us music for the dance with his accordion. Then we would all part for our homes at dawn.”
The annual farm and ranch rodeo held here dates back from the buckin’ bronc and bull riding contests held each summer by the cowboys for their own entertainment. The impromptu horse races out in the surrounding countryside were moved into the small community to encircle what was then the town park. The archives of The Meeker Herald, the Rio Blanco Herald Times, and the Rio Blanco Historical Society give newcomers the best picture of how important those special celebration were to most everyone in the little town of Meeker.
“A number of our cowboys who intend on taking part in the tournament on the Fourth did some tilting practice during the week and proved themselves quite the experts at this exciting sport.”
“The telephone will be in operation for the fourth of July. George Hald, the manager of the Hugus company at Rifle, has the construction of the line in hand and a large force of men are now at work erecting the poles.”
“One of the names of the best bucking broncos was ‘Old Joints.’”
“Body Bag, the nastiest bull at Meeker’s Range Call Rodeo, will be back again this year.”
By dolly viscardi
