Cowboy Spur Maker: The Story of Ed Blanchard

Chapter 4 From Horsebackto Horsepower

As Tom Kelly Remembers [ 60 ] C H A P T E R 4 From Horseback to Horsepower d Blanchard, Jim Kelly, and Fred Martinwere iducted into the army at the same time. They reported to Camp Cody at Deming, New Mexico, on April 11, 1918. The army was buying horses all over the country to be used in World War I. Some of them were six- and seven-year-olds that had never been broke, so the boys were in their element when they were sent to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, to break horses. Everything was a big joke to them, and more than likely, they broke all the horses to buck so they could get even with the cavalry. When they weren’t shoveling manure for doing something wrong, they were breaking horses. They spent about a year in the army before the war ended. Ed was discharged at Camp Travis on January 21, 1919, and came back to the Kelly Ranch in New Mexico. Ed had ridden horses all of his life, so that was his expertise. He always helped the Kellys break their horses. Each year, they handled them for the first time up on Baldy. They ran them into the corral and tied them down. Each man took a horse and saddled him and then rode him off of the mountain. That made for some wild rides! E E From Horseback to Horsepower [ 61 ] When Ed and Uncle Jim were young and they didn’t think they had enough ornery horses of their own to ride, they would go down the Rio Grande and steal ten to fifteen little Mexican horses and bring them up to Water Canyon to practice on for fun. As I said earlier—they weren’t angels. My dad recalled a horse deal that he and Grandpa Kelly made one time with Al Clements, who had a horse ranch on the north end of the San Mateo Mountains. Clements had several hundred horses that had never been touched, and he wanted Pop, Uncle Jim, and Ed to break them. They gathered seventy-five of these horses—all stallions that had never been branded or handled—and brought them to the Flat to break. The deal was that for breaking them, the Kellys could take their pick of half the horses and return the other half to Clements. Pop said they were all so mean they could hardly do anything with them. After they got them half broke, Clements got the bucking part back. If there were any good horses, the Kellys kept them. Pop said Ed Blanchard, Frank Kelly, and Jim Kelly (left to right) had their photo made at the Ranger Station in Water Canyon in 1918 before they left to join the army during World War I. Courtesy Tom Kelly As Tom Kelly Remembers [ 62 ] that’s where Ed really learned to be a bronc rider. Every one of those horses bucked. Ed was only five feet, five inches tall, but he was husky and strong. The boys ran a big, six-year-old horse into the corral, roped him and blindfolded him, and Ed cinched his saddle on him. He had trouble reaching the stirrup, so he jumped up and caught it with the toe of his boot so he could climb in the saddle. That started the wreck! That ol’ horse shot off and the blindfold came off and around and around the corral he went. He threw Ed up on his neck. Then he threw him behind the saddle—then back to his neck again. This time the buttons on the front of Ed’s pants caught over the saddle horn, and ol’ Ed was up on that horn spinning around and around in a circle, flattened out on top of that bucking horse. Finally, Ed’s pants tore off of him, and he landed out on the ground. They thought he had been killed. Uncle Jim ran out to Ed and shook him, and Ed finally mumbled something and staggered to his feet. He held his head and sidled over against the fence until he got his senses back. They caught the horse, and Ed went out there and climbed back on again. He was determined to ride that horse, and he did. Ed was so hard-headed, you couldn’t tell him no about anything he wanted to do. If...