COWBOY STRONG

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN VEGAS

The legendary career of Shawn Davis THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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Shawn Davis: A timeline Dec. 7, 1940 – Born to Mary and Herschel Davis in Butte, Mont.

1968 – Named Montana Pro Athlete of the Year

1946 – Gets on first calf at the age of 5

September 1969 – Inducted into Aksar-Ben Western Hall of Fame

1954 – Earns first paycheck as a rodeo cowboy 1958 – Wins Montana High School bareback riding championship 1961 – Wins saddle bronc riding crown at College National Finals Rodeo 1962 – Wins amateur bronc riding at Calgary (Alberta) Stampede and Cheyenne (Wyo.) Frontier Days 1962 – Begins pro rodeo career as member of Rodeo Cowboys Association (RCA) 1963 – Wins bareback riding and all-around titles at College National Finals Rodeo 1963 – Qualifies for the first of 12 National Finals Rodeos Aug. 25, 1965 – Appears in LIFE magazine as subject of feature article 1965 – Wins first of three saddle bronc riding world titles; sets PRCA earnings record with $25,599 1966 – Qualifies for National Finals Rodeo despite being hurt until June 1967 – Earns pilot’s license 1967 – Wins second saddle bronc riding world championship, finishes second in NFR average 1968 – Repeats as world champion saddle bronc rider, his third gold buckle

HORSEBACK PHOTO BY DEVERE, ALL OTHERS ARE PRCA FILE PHOTOS.

May 25, 1969 – Suffers dislocated and broken back; serves as NFR judge May 24, 1970 – Marries Jean (Jeanna) Roberts 1970 – Served as ambassador on Rodeo Far West tour of Europe 1970 – Serves as judge at National Finals Rodeo Feb. 20, 1971 – Becomes a father when son Zane is born 1972 – Voted Man of the Year by rodeo fans Sept. 17, 1973 – Gored by a bull outside Denton, Texas, but still finishes eighth in world 1975 – Breaks foot in Houston while ranked No. 1 in world standings, misses NFR 1977 – Becomes rodeo coach at the College of Southern Idaho 1977 – Qualifies for 12th and final National Finals Rodeo, finishes third in world 1979 – Inducted into ProRodeo Hall of Fame as part of inaugural class 1979 – Serves as President of National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association (NIRA) 1980 – Begins three-year stint as manager of College National Finals Rodeo 1982 – Named PRCA President, serves through 1985 1983 – Helped organize Presidential Command Performance Rodeo for President Ronald Reagan

Michael Mack Project manager Neal Reid Editor, author Christa VanDyke Art director Eric Berner Cover design

Special thanks to Lisa Jacob of the Las Vegas News Bureau, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association Media Department, Shawn Davis, Ann Bleiker, Kyle Chapin and Las Vegas Events.

PRCA FILE PHOTO

Acknowledgements

Table of Contents Shawn Davis, the cowboy............................... 4 Family man..................................................... 7 The ‘ol college try............................................ 8 Renaissance man........................................... 10 The General.................................................. 13

About the Author The 2017 PRCA Media Award winner for excellence in print journalism, Neal Reid is covering his 15th Wrangler National Finals Rodeo this year. An Auburn University journalism graduate, Reid has been a published writer for more than 20 years. He spent five years as editor of the ProRodeo Sports News, wrote more than 100 “NFR Insider” columns for NFRExperience.com and has been published in American Cowboy, Western Horseman, The Ketchpen and Persimmon Hill and on PBR.com. He covered the 2014 Olympic Winter Games and Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, as a member of the Olympic and Paralympic News Service and has also written for USA Today, Newsday, MLB.com, the Denver Post, Colorado Springs Gazette, Las Vegas Review-Journal and Oakland Tribune. A longtime Associated Press contributor, Reid is a past member of the Rodeo Historical Society, and his writing has also appeared on ESPN.com, ESPNW.com, WashingtonPost.com and in Colorado Springs Style magazine. Follow him on Twitter @NealReid21.

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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PRCA FILE PHOTO

Natural talent

Davis was athletic marvel who rose to pinnacle of the sport

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or as long as he can remember, Shawn Davis had a burning desire to be one thing and one thing only.

“I always wanted to be a world champion cowboy from the time I could walk,” Davis said. “That’s all I really wanted to be.”

Boy, did he ever do that, and more.

The Whitehall, Mont., native grew up on his parents’ sheep and cattle ranch in nearby Whitehall with big dreams, and he did whatever it took to chase them.

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Hooked on the cowboy way of life from the start, Davis learned to ride as early as age 2 after his uncles strapped him to an undersized calf at his paternal grandparents’ place, and he was earning pocket change by the age of 4 from people who were tickled to see him ride.

Davis entered his first rodeo as a 5-yearold and earned his first official paycheck at 13. By then, he was well on his way.

As a teen, Davis made money by breaking horses for nearby ranchers and farmers,

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

PRCA FILE PHOTO

and he went on to ride racehorses as a jockey and exercise rider while in college. He did whatever it took to develop his skills and feed himself and his passion.

“My parents were busy with the ranch and didn’t have any interest in me being a cowboy,” Davis said. “To be able to accomplish some of my goals, I had to figure out ways to get things done.”

The Montana high school bareback riding champion in 1958, Davis went on to earn the first rodeo scholarship ever granted at University of Montana Western. Davis also began producing and organizing rodeos in college and became a Golden Gloves champion after taking up boxing.

Davis credits boxing and working different types of horses for having a big impact on his development as a saddle bronc rider.

“The two things that helped me a lot with my riding was the boxing and

Shawn Davis could ride anything that bucked, including Christensen Brothers’ Blue Rocket here in Lewiston, Idaho, in 1967.

skipping rope helped me a lot with my feet and galloping race horses with the short stirrups,” said Davis, who won races as a jockey. “I couldn’t get a job when I went to college, but I’d ride those race horses when guys couldn’t get anyone to get on. I’d gallop them in the flat saddles, and it’d build up your legs and develop your balance.”

He won the amateur bronc riding titles at the Calgary Stampede and Cheyenne Frontier Days in 1962, then began his professional career that year as a member of the Rodeo Cowboys Association (RCA).

Davis’ first of seven straight National Finals Rodeo qualifications followed in 1963, and he went on to finish 13th in the world. He claimed his first gold buckle and set an earnings record in 1965, finished fifth in 1966 despite being injured until June of that year and went back-to-back as world cham- Continued pion in 1967 and 1968.

ON PAGE 6

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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In its Aug. 20, 1965, issue, LIFE magazine described Davis as a, “saddle bronc rider with a Tarzan build and an extraordinary talent for spurring a horse to a good ride while hanging on with apparent ease.”

He was on top of his game and ready to re-write the history books.

“My goal was to beat Casey Tibbs’ record (of six saddle bronc riding world titles),” said Davis, who also rode bulls and bareback horses with success in the pro ranks. “The years I won world titles, I could win on just about anything.”

Disaster struck on May 25, 1969, when Davis suffered a fractured and dislocated spine when a bronc fell on him at a rodeo in Thompson Falls, Mont. He was leading the world standings at the time and still qualified based on those earnings, but would miss the NFR and undergo 13 grueling months of physical therapy.

Davis would work the NFR as a judge in 1969 and 1970, then returned as a contestant from 1971-74 and again one final time in 1977. His five qualifications after breaking his back are considered by some to be even more impressive than his trio of world championships.

“They actually told me I’d never even ride a saddle horse again,” Davis said. “My back is fused an inch out of place, and I’m an inch shorter because of it. I never could ride as well as I could before I broke my back, so, I had to draw better.”

Injuries would continue to plague Davis the remainder of his career. Gored by a bull in September of 1973, he still finished eighth in the world that year.

He broke his foot in Houston in March of 1975 while leading the world standings, 6

likely costing him another NFR berth, and a broken arm in Cheyenne in 1984 is also part of his medical file.

Davis was forced to temper his expectations and begin to think about the future.

“When I went back to competing and saw that I wasn’t going to set the world on fire, I was pretty honest with myself,” said Davis, who retired in 1989 at age 48. “I don’t think you can be at the top of anything you do if you’re only partially involved. Although I won consistently, I never did set a goal to win another world championship like I had before.

“I think I got as much out of my career as I could have, considering the injuries. I knew I didn’t have the ability, and I had to move on to something else in life.”

In typical Shawn Davis fashion, the “something else” would include 29 years as a beloved and decorated college coach, more than three decades as NFR general manager and an eternal place in history as a true legend of the sport of rodeo.

Shawn Davis was no stranger to injuries, like when he broke his foot here in Houston in 1975.

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

Family man O

ne fateful day in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1969 changed Shawn Davis’ life forever.

A pretty girl in a miniskirt caught his eye while he was competing at the rodeo, and Davis soon made the acquaintance of Jeanna Roberts. The two struck up a conversation, and before long, they were inseparable.

“Back then, we didn’t have cell phones or anything, but we kept communicating,” said Davis, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. “I lived in Oakdale, Calif., in the spring, and she flew to San Francisco. George Paul picked her up and brought her to Oakdale, then we flew to Red Bluff, and that was the first time we’d gone anywhere together.”

They married in 1970 and embarked on a dreamlike European honeymoon that included a stop in Paris, visits with his mother’s family in Ireland and even a chance encounter with the Prime Minister of the Emerald Isle. It was one of many adventures they have been on together in the nearly 50 years since.

“We had really good times,” Davis said.

On Feb. 20, 1971, the young couple welcomed son, Zane, into the world. Not only was Davis a three-time world champion, but he also was now a husband and a father.

Busy competing in rodeo, working as a college coach and juggling fatherhood in the 1970s and 1980s, Davis was a strict, but supportive father.

“I was raised in a pretty intense environment, because he was so busy and had so many irons in the fire,” said Zane, who

JAMES FAIN PHOTO

Shawn poses with son, Zane, and his 1990 NIRA All-Around Cowboy award.

followed his father as a college all-around and bareback riding champion. “He was always very supportive of me, especially with things that interest both of us. He didn’t have a lot of opportunities growing up, and so he always made sure I had plenty of opportunities.”

Jeanna was there at every turn, serving as the perfect complement to Davis with her calming and easygoing temperament.

“In 47 years, I’ve never seen my parents fight,” said Zane, who routinely appeared in national print ads for Tony Lama with his father as a child. “She’s always been supportive of what he’s wanted to do, and any time you’ve been married close to 50 years, something has to be right. He’s an intense individual, whereas my mother is a lot easier-going, and that helps balance things quite a bit.”

Intense, unless it comes to the grandkids, whom Davis admits he and Jeanna tend to spoil on the regular Zane and wife, Holly, have three children – daughters, Zayle and Presley, and son, Dawson.

“Within reason, they get just about whatever they need,” Davis said.

Zane puts it another way.

“He has absolutely no discipline when it comes to them,” Zane said. “I was raised like a soldier, and these three have just done whatever they’ve wanted to. I know that’s not uncommon, but in this case, it was particularly shocking.”

Apparently, grandpa is a role Davis relishes perhaps more than any he’s ever had.

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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Everybody’s

W

All-American

hen Shawn Davis agreed to become the College of Southern Idaho’s rodeo coach in 1977, he looked at the venture as an experiment of sorts that he’d try for a couple years.

“I told (wife) Jeanna it might be an opportunity we look into for a year or two, and if I didn’t like it, we could come back to Texas,” Davis said.

After going through the interview process, a 36-year-old Davis took the plunge, and the couple moved to Twin Falls on somewhat of a whim. They would stay for 29 years.

“When I got there, I’d never had a (real) job,” Davis said. “I’d worked a lot, but working on the ranch or stacking hay were the only jobs I’d ever had. The first paycheck I got was about a third less than I thought it would be, and they said, ‘Well, did you account for all of the taxes and everything that needs to be taken out?’ I said, ‘No, I didn’t.’”

Davis also had to worry about funding the rodeo program from scratch, a major endeavor he attacked head-on and with a cowboy’s determination.

“When I got there, the athletic department didn’t want to have anything

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DAN HUBBELL PHOTO

Shawn Davis’ College of Southern Idaho teams won national championships in 1996 and from 2001-02.

to do with the rodeo team,” Davis said.

“I never thought anything about it, I just got on the phone and made a few calls.

They did buy me some bucking chutes, though, and I had enough Powder River panels to make an arena.”

Davis had just seven members of the rodeo team that first year, but he quickly laid the foundation for a successful program, and students took notice.

“I announced I was going to have a rodeo school to have a fundraiser,” he said. “We put on a rodeo and didn’t have many seats, but we sold it out and had people all packed in.”

The word spread, and Davis and his rodeo team kept conducting successful event after successful event. The second year, he had 70 students on the team.

To be on Shawn Davis’ rodeo team didn’t just mean you’d learn to ride or rope. It meant you would learn every aspect of the rodeo business.

“They sold tickets and sponsorships, organized the security and manned and ran all the chutes, and we put on high school and junior rodeos, too,” said Davis, who served as National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association president in 1979. “I could

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

The College of Southern Idaho re-named its rodeo arena in honor of Shawn Davis in 2002.

KYLE CHAPIN PHOTO

call them together, and in 30 minutes we could organize a rodeo. I could take my rodeo team and put on the National Finals Rodeo very successfully because they were totally disciplined.

“We never had an unsuccessful financial event.”

Davis and his team held all types of fundraisers, none more successful than his boxing “smoker.” Team members would get in the ring and duke it out, and the ticketed event became a wildly popular attraction on campus.

“I sold it out for 20-something years, and we raised $40,000 one night with that,” said Davis, who managed the College National Finals Rodeo from 1980-82. “A kid might not fight too well, but if he’d get in there and try, he’d do the same in rodeo. So, there was a correlation there.”

Davis also helped the rodeo team get scholarships through the NIRA and set up a junior rodeo association that was aligned with CSI, as well as the Western States Circuit for Idaho, Oregon and Washington along the way. His CSI team also would organize and run the Benny Binion’s World Famous Bucking Horse &

Bull Sale at the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo for nearly two decades after it began in Las Vegas in 1985.

And in the arena, the rodeo team was simply dominant. Davis’ team won 24 regional titles and national championships in 1996, 2001 and 2002 during his tenure there from 1977-2007. Numerous CSI alumni went on to qualify for the Wrangler NFR, and three of his collegiate stars – Cody Wright, Cody Hancock and Blue Stone – became world champions.

“Sometimes, we’d win every event, and sometimes we’d win every place in several events,” Davis said. “We had some great accomplishments with the kids there over the years.”

His legacy lives on at CSI to this day.

“Shawn Davis put the College of Southern Idaho Rodeo Team on the map,” said current CSI Rodeo Team Head Coach Steven Birnie. “His leadership helped establish CSI as one of the premier rodeo programs in the country. The foundations Shawn laid here at CSI have been carried on to the present day. The sense of tradition and excellence is, and has been, a part of our rodeo program.”

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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JIMMIE HURLEY PHOTOS

Renaissance Man I

Talented Davis a true Jack of all trades

f it involves a horse or the sport of rodeo, Shawn Davis can and has done it all.

From training, riding, raising and racing horses to organizing and running rodeos, rodeo schools, fundraisers and clinics, the Whitehall, Mont., cowboy has accomplished a great deal in his 77 years.

Most people know Davis as the accomplished general manager of the Wrangler National Finals rodeo, or as a three-time world champion saddle bronc rider and ProRodeo Hall of Famer, while others

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remember his days as a national championship-winning coach at the College of Southern Idaho.

“In the horse industry, I’ve done about it all,” said Davis, who was bestowed with the Indian name “Three Eagles” by the Blackfeet Indian Tribe as a gesture of gratitude for doing rodeo schools and speaking engagements for the tribe. “I’ve always been fairly athletic and could do about anything I wanted to do and be somewhat competitive.”

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

“I flew because it was a necessity, not because I loved to fly ...

One reason (I learned) is I had a lot of speeding tickets.”

But there’s even more to know about the affable father and grandfather – much more.

For instance, Davis was part of a group of roughly a dozen top-flight cowboys who earned their pilot’s licenses in the 1960s and 1970s, and they would fly themselves to rodeos as they chased gold buckles and raced to bucking chutes across the country. Davis earned his pilot’s license in 1967 – the same year he won his second world title – and owned a 250 Comanche and N-Model Bonanza during his flying days.

For Davis, becoming a pilot was more a matter of necessity than anything else.

“I flew because it was a necessity, not because I loved to fly,” he said. “It wasn’t that difficult to learn, and I had friends

who had airplanes. Everybody flew, and it was convenient.”

But that wasn’t his only motivation for becoming a pilot.

“One reason is I had a lot of speeding tickets,” Davis said. “I had an airplane before I had a pilot’s license, and I probably had 200 hours in the airplane before I completed my training.”

Speaking of training, many folks may not realize how accomplished he is as a trainer of elite race horses. Davis got his horse training license in 1991 and has won hundreds of races as owner and operator of Shawn Davis Racing, a passion project that has grown into a highly successful venture.

Davis – whose friends include Continued two-time Kentucky Derby-win- ON PAGE 12

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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Shawn Davis is an accomplished horse trainer, and one of his prized steeds, Chief Cicatriz, won The Aristides at Churchill Downs in June.

ning trainer Carl Nafzger – has raced his Thoroughbreds everywhere from Arapahoe, Colo., Phoenix, Iowa, San Antonio and Winnipeg, Canada, to Kentucky, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Minnesota and California. Training race horses feeds Davis’ innate desire to compete, something passed down from two generations on both sides of his family.

It’s the same desire that transformed Davis into a Golden Gloves boxing champion in college at the University of Montana Western.

“From the time I was a little kid, you had to defend yourself,” Davis said. “I was small and a year ahead in school, and they knocked the hell out of me. I’d catch a ride up to the boxing gym with a neighbor. As a little kid, I wasn’t very good, but I developed.

“In my family, it was kind of the culture where everybody went to the bars and had fights, and they expected you to win.”

Davis learned “the sweet science” from former pro boxer Buddy Holland during his high school years, and it stuck with him in college. He would go on to conduct boxing “smokers” while a college coach at CSI as fundraisers for the rodeo team.

“I’d go over to (Buddy’s) place after school and spar with him, and he’d teach me how to box,” Davis said. “When I went to college, I took my boxing gloves 12

PHOTO COURTESY OF COADY PHOTOGRAPHY

with me, and by then I could handle the guys in the dorm pretty easily. The boxing coach heard about us sparring in the dorm and asked us if we’d try out for the boxing team.

“I’d never had any ring fights before, and he put me in the ring with a kid who had won the welterweight championship the year before. I could handle that kid, and so he was really impressed. That’s how I got started.”

Natural athletic ability also carried Davis to a win in the inaugural Cowboy Open Winter Sport Competition – precursor to the Cowboy Downhill that is held in Steamboat Springs, Colo., each year – at Arapahoe (Colo.)

Ski Basin in 1969.

Just about the only thing that didn’t work out for Davis was an experiment with tap dancing as a small child of 5 or 6. His mother, Mary, entered him in tap dancing classes with his younger sisters, Nanette and Gail, but that didn’t exactly go as planned.

“My mother believes to this day that I did it on purpose, but at the first recital we went to, I spun around to do my bow, but spun around a half turn too far and bowed with my butt to the audience,” Davis said. “She still thinks I did it on purpose to humiliate her, so she let me quit after that.”

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

PHOTO BY FRED MCCLANAHAN

The General

Davis has role as Wrangler NFR GM down to a science

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ong before he was General Manager of the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo, Shawn Davis was producing rodeos even as a young collegian.

While at the University of Montana Western, Davis found himself charged with the task of putting on a rodeo when no one else from his rodeo team stepped up to the plate.

“I was president of the rodeo club,” Davis said. “When it came time to put on our rodeo, they would only give us $600 to put it on, and the rodeo team didn’t want to do it.”

Showing ingenuity well beyond his years, Davis figured out a way to draw attention to the event and get students to show up.

“I went to one of the sororities and asked them if they wanted to help run a rodeo, and they were interested,” Davis said. “Once I got them on board, the football team came along and then everyone on campus knew about it.”

That early success was one of many to come for Davis as a rodeo producer, and he honed his skills as an event manager

by putting on numerous schools and clinics as a young professional cowboy. He also absorbed the knowledge of Rodeo Cowboys Association (RCA) leaders Lex Connolly and Tommy Steiner when they tabbed him to be a focal point in the association’s PR campaigns.

“I always knew you had to have a product and had to make the people want to come and see the product,” Davis said.

“I listened to what was going on and how they put a press conference together to sell a rodeo, and I realized that you had to produce a two-hour performance and produce it so the people in the stands wanted to come back the next night and not just the next year.”

Davis was gaining knowledge that would serve him well in future roles.

“When I went to the college (College of Southern Idaho), I didn’t have any money and couldn’t screw up,” Davis said of his college coaching tenure. “I had to put on events that brought people in. I put on successful college rodeos for the college, and I took over Continued for the NIRA. ON PAGE 14

THE LEGENDARY CAREER OF SHAWN DAVIS COWBOY STRONG

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PHOTO BY SUE ROSOFF

John Burke (left) and Shawn Davis were NFR co-managers from 1986-91.

“I made $4,000 the first year, then I made $25,000 and then made $75,000, and that’s when I became PRCA president and went to the National Finals.”

It is well known that Davis, while PRCA president, cast the deciding vote to move the NFR to Las Vegas, and he became co-GM with John Burke for the event’s second year in the Entertainment Capital of the World in 1986. Although serving that role was not part of his plan, Davis began streamlining the rodeo and trimming the fat from all areas as PRCA president, then accelerated those efforts as GM. “I never planned on running the National Finals Rodeo,” said Davis, who took over as sole GM in 1992.

“The National Finals was falling apart and was taking three-and-a-half hours or better (in Oklahoma City), and there was mass confusion. Lynn Beutler said, ‘Unless you do something about this, you’re not going to have a National Finals Rodeo,’ and Lynn was about as good as there’s ever been in knowing about production.”

Davis’ experience from CSI proved invaluable.

“When I was at the college, I had to set up the chutes and the pens, and (wife) Jeanna and (son) Zane had to help me a lot of times,” he said. “So, when it came to the National Finals, I knew 14

how to set everything up and knew how everything worked. There isn’t a job at the National Finals Rodeo that I haven’t done, so that’s where the experience level comes in.”

Davis developed a wealth of firsthand knowledge he still uses to this day, and he has worked with the Wrangler NFR Committee and his staff to keep the event relevant and running smoothly.

From adding interactive fan elements, keeping entertainment fresh and modernizing various aspects of the look and feel of the rodeo – all while fitting it neatly into a two-hour television time window – Davis and his crew have given the Wrangler NFR the consistency it so badly needed.

Davis has the rodeo’s production honed to a finely tuned science.

“At this point, I can’t perfect it any more than we have it perfected right now,” Davis said. “We’ve taken it to a point where I’d hoped to take it, as far as producing the rodeo.”

Now as he prepares to hand the reins over to Boyd Polhamus, Davis feels confident the rodeo is in good hands.

“It’s come time for me and several others to move on,” Davis said. “I think Boyd is very thorough and very smart.

He’s got a good background, and I feel very confident in him. I think Boyd can handle it.”

COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS

Shawn Davis: A timeline 1984 – Receives NIRA Outstanding Service Award 1984 – Breaks arm at Cheyenne (Wyo.) Frontier Days Rodeo 1984 – Named PRCA Man of the Year Dec. 12, 1984 – Casts deciding vote to bring National Finals Rodeo to Las Vegas (right) 1986 – Becomes co-general manager of National Finals Rodeo with John Burke 1987 – Named PRCA Man of the Year 1989 – Retires from competition at age of 48; Inducted into Western Montana Hall of Fame 1991 – Earns horse training license

February 2002 – General Manager of Production for the Olympic Command Performance during the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City 2002 – Repeats as national champions at College of Southern Idaho, the school’s third title; CSI names rodeo arena in his honor 2005 – Inducted into the College of Southern Idaho Athletic Hall of Fame 2006 – Inducted into National Circuit Finals Hall of Fame 2007 – Retires as rodeo coach at College of Southern Idaho 2011 – Honored by Rodeo Historical Society in Oklahoma City, Okla. (left) 2011 – Receives Legend of ProRodeo award from PRCA (below)

1991 – Receives WPRA National Western Award

2012 – Receives NFR Lifetime Achievement Award from Women’s Professional Rodeo Association (WPRA)

1992 – Takes over as sole general manager of National Finals Rodeo

Nov. 16, 2012 – Granddaughter Presley is born

1991 – Inducted into Southern Idaho Livestock Hall of Fame

1996 – Coaches College of Southern Idaho to first national championship May 24, 1999 – Becomes a grandfather when granddaughter Zayle is born 2000 – General Manager of Production for the FEI World Cup in Las Vegas 2001 – Guides College of Southern Idaho to its second national championship

Dec. 7, 2015 – Shawn Davis Day declared in Las Vegas by Mayor Carolyn Goodman to honor 75th birthday 2017 – Receives Lane Frost Memorial Award May 5, 2018 – Trained racehorse Chief Cicatriz that ran in Race 5 at Churchill Downs on Kentucky Derby day ridden by Gary Stevens

Jan. 10, 2002 – Grandson Dawson is born

June 2, 2018 – Race horse Chief Cicatriz wins The Aristides at Churchill Downs

2002 – Honored as a Legend of RodeoHouston at Houston Astrodome

Oct. 20, 2018 – Inducted, along with son Zane, into Idaho Rodeo Hall of Fame

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COWBOY STRONG THE MAN BEHIND THE NFR LEGACY IN LAS VEGAS