The second show was saddled up in a large circus tent “on the hill” where the present National Western grounds are enclosed each January. A feature in that 1907 event was not the rodeo, but an exhibit of harness horses going through their paces, with the Gentlemen’s Riding and Driving Club assisting in providing arena entertainment under the canvas. Extra enjoyment for the horse-watching crowd was provided by the flapping canvas – and horse reaction – under a strong wind. .

Then, in 1908, the third show found itself in a frame amphitheater for the horse show matinee performances. Filled at every performance, the seats were under cover along the sides of the wooden structure, but the arena in the center used the sky as a roof.

Today’s National Western stadium, that is being retired as the rodeo and horse show arena to the spaciousness of the enormous new Coliseum across the street, was built during 1908 in time for the opening of the 1909 National Western. In contrast to the nearly $3,000,000 required to build the streamlined Denver Coliseum (a two year job), the old brick National Amphitheater, as it was first called, cost $200,000, although that represented a lot of hard-earned dollars in that less inflated era. 

Denver’s new, near $3,000,000 Coliseum where the rodeo and horse show performances will be staged in the 1952 Nation Western Stock Show.

There was no 1 ½ million dollar bond issue voted by Denver taxpayers, nor a $750,000 fund drive, such as underlined the construction of the new stadium that was completed last fall. Rather, the $200,000 for the stadium, which visionary pioneers predicted would be adequate eternally, was put up by the National Packing Co., owned by Swift, Armour, and other packers as the firm controlling and operating the Denver stockyards.

Saddled to the 1908 contract to build, however, was the stipulation that the parent Western Stock Show association would keep the show on the road each winter for at least 10 years. Later, as the exposition developed and grew, the stockyards first threw up temporary buildings on the show grounds, and later bricked-up the present buildings for livestock housing.

From the start, horses were a vital factor in the National Western, although the type and kind have changed down through the years. In that initial show of 1906 when “premiums were ribbons and glory,” as the late, beloved Harry Petrie, early-day manager of the show, described the event, around 20 horses were lined up for the judge. They weren’t Quarter Horses or of Palomino color, but were the big, powerful draft horses, later forced into the background by the horseless carriage.

By 1908, horse entries had run up to 120 head, spread through six divisions that the 1952 younger generation might have trouble recognizing – Percheron, French draft; Shire, coach horse, grade-draft colts … and believe it or not in Colorado, mules. Gone are the draft horses and mules today, their places more than taken by Quarter
Horses, Palominos, and fine horse show stock like hunters and jumpers, all of them overcrowding the box stall space.

Draft horse breeders sat in on the making of the show in its early days. William M. Springer was a charter member of the association. R. A. Chace, of Fort Morgan, Colo., was a pioneer director of the sponsoring association which was organized on January 31, 1906, corralled under the name of the Western Livestock association. Today it is incorporated and recognized as the Western Stock Show association.

Now, the tent-born show is a tradition as it moves the bread-and-butter part of the National Western financial ledger (the rodeo and horse show) to new quarters for the third time. In its quickly maturing progress … from tent to stadium to Coliseum… the show has brought thousands of stockmen and their livestock along the trail leading to better breeding, better feeding, better ranching, and better merchandising and showmanship.

Nowhere else on the continent can you find as many pens and carloads of purebred bulls as the more than 2,000 head that populate the Denver yards each January. At no other show will you see as many carloads of choice feeder calves and yearlings of all three breeds as the several hundred loads appearing in the National Western from the prairie and from the high country each year.

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