The Freeway Rodeo

We recently finished reading about the local Montrose Rodeo series of 1945, ’46, ’47 and ’48. They were held in horse rings at working stables and on undeveloped vacant land. Half of the fun of these events was the participation of Montrose merchants in various cowboy-themed high jinks, and a celebrity-studded pre-event parade.

But in 1973 and ’74, the valley put on a homegrown rodeo on the freeway! The not-yet-opened portion of the 2 Freeway served as both the rodeo ring and the parking lot for attendees. It was probably the only “freeway rodeo” ever held anywhere. I’ll concentrate here on the ’73 event.

The idea for a rodeo came from the Crescenta-Cañada Jaycees, one of the many service organizations locally. Jaycee stands for J.C., or Junior Chamber of Commerce. The Jaycee organization at that time was for young men, 18 to 35, and stressed leadership training and community service.

This rodeo would be a fundraiser for the Jaycees’ many charitable causes and would serve in place of its yearly carnival fundraiser. It contracted with a professional rodeo organization to bring in the equipment needed along with professional cowboys competing for points towards national championships. The freeway site was procured through the Dept. of Highways, today’s Caltrans.

I recently spoke to a man who was in the Jaycees at that time. He told me that in 1973, the interchange of the 2 and 210 Freeway had been paved, but just south of that the hard-packed earth had not yet been covered with concrete. The on-ramp from Verdugo Boulevard just south of Verdugo Hospital was utilized to access the freeway, as was the Foothill Boulevard on-ramp near the YMCA. A half-mile of cement was available to park thousands of cars. South of that, where the freeway hadn’t been paved yet, a La Cañada construction firm donated heavy equipment to churn up the hard pack. Dump trucks brought in tons of softer dirt and hay for the cowboys to land on when they came off their rides. Over that went corrals and grandstands for 3,500 people.

But even that wasn’t enough. Over 5,000 people showed up on both days of the two-day rodeo event, many of them finding alternate seating on the terraced cuts of the east side of the soon-to-be freeway.

This rodeo attracted some major cowboy talent from as far away as Australia and Cuba, and all over the U.S. The crowd thrilled to the standard rodeo events – bull riding and bronc busting, calf roping, steer busting, bareback and saddle bronc riding, barrel racing and team roping. One La Crescenta girl was good enough to compete in the barrel racing, although she didn’t win. The only injury was to a Marine from Camp Pendelton who fractured his pelvis coming off a bucking bronco.

Two locals entered the bull riding event, but only as an exhibition. The sports editor for the Ledger newspaper gave it a try and managed six seconds before hitting the ground and scrambling away. Joe Avignone, owner of Avignone’s Bar, gave it a try and came off at about the five-second mark.

In the early ’70s there were the beginnings of awareness of cruelty to animals, particularly in rodeos. The local paper, the Ledger, printed a long and detailed letter from Nola Dolberg who pointed out the injuries rodeo animals suffer. (Nola is immortalized in Glenola Park in La Cañada, championed by Glenn and Nola Dolberg.) The very conservative Ledger made light of Nola’s concern, pointing out that rodeo animals work about five minutes a year, eight seconds at a time, and spend the rest of their time loafing and eating.

The Jaycees made out well in 1973 turning an excellent profit selling sodas, beer and hot dogs, and plowed that considerable sum into their community projects. But, according to my source, they lost their shorts in 1974 when they turned the food concession over to an outside vendor.

It was a successful event for the unopened freeway. But more was to come in the form of the TV show “CHiPs” along with other shows and movies filmed on this section of the 2/210 in the late ’70s.