As 600 head of fractious livestock and 200 cowboys and cowgirls clattered into New York’s Madison Square Garden last week for the 12th annual World’s Championship Rodeo, one important face was ...

A rider hangs tough during a rodeo at Madison Square Garden in New York, 1957. Ernst Haas / Hulton Archive / Getty Images The modern gold-and-rhinestone, big-money televised sport of rodeo owes ...