When I was about 5 years old, my mom took me to Helena, Montana, to meet an old gal who was in a nursing home. I don’t remember all of it, but I do remember her sitting there very proud, with a blanket across her lap. She pointed to a chest under the bed for my mom to drag out and open. To me, the contents looked like nothing more than old plates, worn leather and lots and lots of tarnished silver. Years later, I’d learn her name was Fannie — Fannie Sperry Steele. She was a champion bronc rider, one of the first. Those items in that chest were her champion buckles and a lifetime of incredible memories.
North of Helena lies the “Sleeping Giant” in the Beartooth Mountains, a formation that looks as if a huge giant is lying on his back across the horizon. Under that giant was the Sperry ranch, where Fannie grew up breaking horses. We went to Helena for our supplies, so we passed the Sleeping Giant often. Each time we made the trip, Mom told me more about Fannie.
Fannie loved horses and started her rodeo career as a relay rider, only to later claim the title of Woman Saddle Bronc Riding Champion of the World. She won the Calgary Stampede in 1912 (while her mother sat with the king and queen of England) and the Winnipeg Stampede in 1913. During that time, most rodeos were mere exhibitions where the constants rode for free. The Calgary Stampede was one of the first rodeos to put actual money on the line. Unlike many of her fellow female competitors, Fannie was known for not riding hobbled, choosing to forgo the dangerous practice of riding with her stirrups tied.
She married a bronc rider named Bill Steele in 1913, and together they rode in the Miller Brothers’ Wild West show until 1930. In 1916, Fannie rode in Buffalo Bill’s final Wild West show in Chicago.
Mom made the trip to Helena countless times to visit with Fannie to learn more about her life and everything she had seen and done. Fannie passed soon after I met her in the winter of ’83. I can only imagine how wild a time it must have been in her day.
There’s not a single time I’ve been by the Sleeping Giant and not thought of her running horses through the hills.
My friend Tona Freeman Blake has had a similar experience but Tona’s encounter which wound up being enough material for a great, fantastic early American woman super hero (heroine)
I took care of Fanny Steele when I worked at the Old Cooney Covelesent in Helena back In the 1970s. At that time Senator Mike Mansfields Sister was also a resident there. A trip down Memory Lane for sure.