Black cowboys have existed in America since the 16th century. Black cowboys and cowgirls have long impacted cultures in the south, midwest, and all over the nation, and have played an influential role throughout America’s history and present-day homesteading culture. While this legacy is not often prominent in mainstream media, the success of Beyonce’s Cowboy Carter and the Rodeo Chitlin Circuit Tour, and the crossover appeal of the likes of country music sensations Mickey Guyton and Tanner Addell, there’s been a newfound interest and resurgence in Black rodeo culture. Ivan McClellan, enrepreneur, photographer, and author of 8 Seconds: Black Rodeo Culture didn’t really know much about Black rodeo culture until 2015 when he attended a rodeo in Oklahoma, when he instantly fell in love with the richness of vibrancy of this niche community.
“I saw things that I knew about Black culture, people doing the ‘Cupid Shuffle,’ smoked Turkey legs, people in Jordans, and women with braids and acrylic nails. But, they were on horseback and it was mixed with modern Western culture, and country culture, which I had always loved in a completely seamless way. And, I kept going back year after year and going from event to event until I really got deep in the culture and started to build strong relationships.” This obsession and passion for documenting the quintessential American sports associated with rodeo, birthed 8 Seconds, a cultural movement that essentially “Fuses Western heritage and tradition with Black creativity, style, and showmanship.”
McClellan began to learn the personal stories and experiences of the Black cowboys and cowgirls that he encountered and photographed. And, he immediately felt a calling to help these athletes who competed in bull riding, bareback bronco riding, barrell racing, and mutton bustin’ gain access to more exposure, capital, training, and resources. “I had a friend, a bull rider named Ouncie Mitchell, and he was a wonderful bull rider, and he was doing really well not just in the Black rodeo world, but in the Pro Rodeo world. He ended up getting murdered in Salt Lake City, Utah by a woman that he really didn’t know well, [that he was staying with while on the road] and it broke my heart.” McClellan felt a conviction to begin to find ways to empower these cowboys and help to sustain them on their road to success without them having to compromise their safety.
“When we started the rodeo, I wanted to throw something that was a big money event. I wanted to throw an event that got these athletes in front of big brands. I wanted them to get exposure in front of thousands of fans.” McCllelan is on a mission to make sure that Black cowboys and cowgirls do not get left behind, and as the trailblazing founder of 8 Seconds Rodeo, which he created in 2023, he has secured $60,000 in prize money sponsored by Jordan, for this year’s events. This year, the 8 Seconds Rodeo is expanding for its third and most electrifying year on June 15 in Portland, OR (Veterans Memorial Coliseum) and on October 11th in Philadelphia, PA (Liacouras Center) for its East Coast premiere. The mission for 8 Seconds goes beyond the rodeo event, too. 8 Seconds also provides materials and supplies support to athletes, and offers new talents with a series of bull riding and bronco riding camp training programs in Wasco, OR, taught by seasoned pros.
ESSENCE recently spoke with McClellan about Black Rodeo culture, the history of Black cowboys and cowgirls, and his passion for the culture.
ESSENCE: What was the inspiration behind “8 Seconds,” and can you also speak to the name?
Ivan McClellan: Eight seconds is how long you have to ride a bull, or a Bronco, to get a qualifying score [in the rodeo]. It seems like a short amount of time until you’re on a raging animal that wants you off its back real bad. And, then you might as well be on there [the animal’s back] for a year. So, I thought it’s an interval of time that these cowboys live and die by. It’s a time that they can either get some money, or go home with nothing, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. And, that kind of seemed like an appropriate name for the brand and the event.
ESSENCE: I love how your photos truly places Black faces with rodeo sports. Pictures can really tell the story sometimes, in a way that words can not. Can you speak about a cowboy’s connection to the land?
IM: They are some cowboys who live on a different level energetically. They are connected to they’re animals in silent communication. A barrel racer can do amazing things and really control her animal with few, or no words, because they’re in sync. They’re lined up spiritually. They can tell what that animal is about to do and what that animal is feeling. They can tell what you’re feeling and what you’re thinking. They’re just tapped in, in a different way. So, I make sure that when I go and interact with these cowboys that I’m spiritually right. You have to get them comfortable with you real quick, and otherwise, you won’t get really far with them if you’re nervous, jumpy, or coming in with some strange energy.
And it’s the same way with their animals. They [cowboys and cowgirls] live in the dirt. A steer wrestler, a bull rider, a barrel racer are all really in touch with the dirt, and they understand the different kind of dirts in different regions. They’ll talk to you about the red clay in Oklahoma. They’ll talk to you about the rich, black soil that you see in Atlanta. And, when you get down south–the red clay, and the sand that you get in the deserts of Arizona. All of this dirt causes them to perform differently. All of this dirt has a different connection to the cowboys regionally. And, they’re so in tune with it. They’re so locked in. When they come up to the show in Portland, the dirt’s a little wet, because it rains all the time and they’ll let you know about it. They say “Hey, my horse didn’t go so fast in this mess.” And I’m like, this is what we got up here. The cowboy from Texas will compete a little bit differently when they go from region to region.
ESENCE: What actually happens at a Rodeo, and what are some of the elements of the sports event?
IM: So at our rodeo, people show up at 3 o’clock for a 7 o’clock show. You don’t show up at 7:30 and just go sit in your seats. You show up at three, get a nice meal, some chicken, a burger or a smoked Turkey leg. You get yourself a strawberry pop and you sit down with folks elbow to elbow in their Western wear, and have community. We have line dancing, and a line dancing instructor. We got the clack fans out. People are, are moving and grooving together in unison doing the same dance, which is, you know, another community builder. There’s mechanical bulls, and some of our cowboys teach roping lessons. You can learn how to catch a steer with a lasso, too, which a lot of people get excited about.
It’s just that type of family reunion vibes that you get at our rodeo, while showing off their best Western wear. I love it. We do three rodeo events. We do barrel racing where the ladies go 50 miles an hour around barrels with their braids blowing behind them, and acrylic nails clutching the reins. And, we have bareback riding where a fellow will ride a wild bucket horse and jump off of it in eight seconds and do a back flip off of the fence ’cause he is so excited that he made the whistle. Then, we do bull riding, the most dangerous and toughest sport in rodeo. We also do mutton busting. We’ll take a perfectly happy kid and put it on a sheep! We have comedians that keep the crowd entertained between events. The comedian this year is X Mayo.
ESSENCE: Can you speak to the legacy of Black cowboys and their place in American history?
IM: Black folks have been cowboying since the beginning, and there are great legends in this world from Nat Love who really was the only Black cowboy to write his own story down. And, he has some great legends of being a phenomenal rodeo competitor and driving cattle from the south and all across America. There’s Bill Pickett who invented the sport of steer wrestling. He would jump off his horse and wrestle a steer to the ground by biting it on the lip. There’s Mary Fields who was the first female to work for the postal service. She would drive a stage coach across the rugged terrain of Montana and deliver mail. She had a shotgun by her side and a pistol in her hip and a flask. And, she was one of the roughest people in the west, and very well respected. She could go into any saloon and drink with the men, but she also had kids and would babysit. So, she was a rich and deep character. All of these stories are so important to our history, and I think they should be taught in school and known by everybody because it aligns Black folks with the independence and grit of the West. We had Buffalo soldiers fighting and clearing the West, and everybody should know these stories and be proud of the Black tradition of independence and grit in this country.
ESSENCE: For those who may want to do some research, who are currently some of your favorite cowboys in the culture and what’s your favorite thing about about cowboy culture?
IM: One of my favorite cowboys and a good friend that I have in this world is Ronnie Davis. Ronnie Davis competes in a sport called pony express, which is a relay race on horseback. He’s a cowboy out of Oklahoma. He also is learning how to be a calf roper, but he’s also walked in the Louis Vuitton fashion show in Paris from Pharrell’s first line for men which was Western themed.
Tank Adams, is another favorite cowboy out of Oklahoma. He owns a trucking company. He trades currency, and he’s a project manager for a roofing company. He does whatever he needs to, to support his, his family. And, he rides bareback, broncos, and bulls in our event. He rides in two events and does really well, and is a crowd favorite for sure at our event.
Another cowgirl that’s going to show up at our event this year is named Courtney Solomon. Courtney is a fourth generation cowgirl out of Houston, Texas. And her mom, Kenisha Jackson will also be competing in our event. They’re just phenomenal cowgirls through and through. They really have that same seamless communication with the animals, but do it with a whole lot of swagger and flare at the event. I’m sure they’re gonna show up in some sequins and fringe, and really show out in front of the crowd. There are so many people that I love in this world.
ESSENCE: What are some of your favorite Western films?
My favorite Western film growing up was Tombstone, with Val Kilmer. It took me until I got older and really discovered Black cowboy culture to go back and watch that movie and realize there’s not a Black person in there. Realizing that there’s nobody that looks like me in the film really made me understand the importance of representation and getting these images and stories in front of young people. But, now, there are lots of movies I enjoy like Posse with Mario Van Peeples, and The Harder They Fall, which is a cold-blooded amazing film. There’s been a renaissance of Black Western films lately, and it’s just so exciting to see that Black folks are controlling that narrative and getting these stories out into the world today.
ESSENCE: What are some of the concerns of Black cowboys and cowgirls across the nation? And, what are some of the joys of Black Rodeo culture?
IM: The biggest challenge that I’ve seen these cowboys face is just the funds to get down the road and to compete at this level. Anybody can compete in pro rodeo, but you need hundreds of thousands of dollars to do it. Realistically, you’ve gotta have a phenomenal horse, a trailer, a truck feed, hotels and entry fees to compete for a rodeo season. And, you’re going to over 60 events to have a chance at making it to the finals. So it’s incredibly difficult, and I’m not seeing a lot of Black athletes get the sponsorship and support that they need to do that.
But, there’s so much good! If you go to the Roy Leblanc Invitational Rodeo & Festival, you’ll see people just camping out for three days and connecting with each other. And, the prize money isn’t big, but they’re there to show out, show what they can do in front of the crowd, and show what they can do in front of the other athletes. It’s so amazing to see bull riders who are in fierce competition risking their lives for prize money. But, after they get off of their bull, they go back up onto the chutes and they help the next rider. There’s a lot of love and support, and everybody wants to see everyone do well. And, that’s something that you don’t see in a lot of other competitions. But, that’s what you get in cowboy culture and in Black Rodeo.
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