Fort Worth

Cowboys of Color gallop into Dickie's Arena at Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo

The first Cowboys of Color Rodeo at the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo was held in 2010 to mark the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

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The Cowboys of Color Rodeo filled seats at Dickie's Arena on Monday, the highlight of Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo events to mark the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday.

"I want 'em to feel included in Western history, included in rodeo," Cowboys of Color Rodeo General Manager Wendell Hearn said. "I always say, we want to build a rodeo fan!"

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Hearn's father, Cleo Hearn, founded the Cowboys of Color Rodeo to bring diversity to the rodeo.

"It's a chance to tell the whole story," Hearn said. "If you just watch what's on television, you wouldn't have known there was an African American, or Native American, or Hispanic cowboy."

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The Cowboys of Color Rodeo features more than 200 African American, Hispanic and Native American athletes.

'I've been doing it my whole life, since I've been 10," tie-down calf roper Rodney Jackson said. 'That's my rodeo family. Everybody here, I know 'em... and then looking out into the crowd, I see my peers. That's what makes me love it so much!"

Jackson is very aware of the crowd. Particularly the younger people watching him.

"Somebody they can look up to," Jackson said. "And they can say, I can be like him!"

That extends beyond the athletes.

"Well, I'm a violinist all the time, but today I'm a part-time fiddle," violinist Armond Vance said. Vance has been a featured performer at Cowboys' of Color for 4-years. "So I really want kids to see that you can look like me, you can be black, and play the violin as well."

Showing future violinists and rodeo athletes, if they can see it, they can be it.

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