Full Circle - National Team Roping

From the Arizona desert to the California coast and back again, Judy and Ozzie Gillum have etched a permanent mark on the team roping industry.

Ruth Wales did everything she could to keep her daughter away from the barn, but to no avail. Judy Wales Gillum had absolutely no desire to do anything else. For more than 60 years—a majority of that with her husband Ozzie Gillum by her side—her impact on the team roping and rodeo industry has spanned far and wide.

“I always had a real desire to be with the horses,” recalled Gillum, a WPRA Gold Card holder and former world champion.

Born and raised in Queen Creek, Ariz., Gillum has known good horses all her life.

The youngest of three, her father is the late Roy Wales. A life-long Arizona rancher and cowboy, Wales was renowned in the rodeo horse business and most widely known for his stallion, Driftwood Ike.

“My dad purchased Driftwood Ike in utero. He just knew that was going to be a great cross,” Gillum said. “He was foaled in 1953, the same year I was born.”

Wales trained and competed on the legendary stallion but eventually sold him to Johnny Kieckhefer of the K4 Ranch in Prescott, Ariz., where he would live out his legacy. By the 1970s and into the ‘80s, Driftwood Ike foals were the rodeo cowboys’ dream. The National Finals team roping and calf roping would regularly have 18 to 21 of the contestants riding a horse with Driftwood blood in it. For generations, Driftwood Ike’s offspring impacted the industry, and—even today— his lineage plays a significant role in the Gillums’ own storied legacy.

Not only can she still hold her own in any roping arena, but Judy also spent years as one of the leading Classic Ropes dealers in the country. Her and Ozzie’s Driftwood breeding program produced some of team roping’s standout mounts from the mid-1980s and on. In 1994, she founded the original World Championship Dummy Roping, which is still held each year during The National Finals Rodeo.

And you’d be hard-pressed to find a top- 15 PRCA team roper from the last 30 years who hasn’t shared a meal around her dinner table. She’s an entrepreneur, a businesswoman and a cowgirl to the core.

When Judy Gillum graduated from high school in 1971, the Women’s Professional Rodeo Association All-Girl rodeos were in full swing.

“A bunch of us girls got together and traveled to those rodeos,” Gillum recalled. “We pulled in at Ramona (California) thinking we were pretty wolfy.

Unfortunately for us, we’d never heard of Sue Pirtle. If you’ve seen the old movie Rodeo Girl, that was based on Sue. Well, she had one horse she headed and heeled, roped calves and steer undecorated on. She kicked our butt in every event all year long on that one horse.”

In 2012, at 59 years old, Gillum competed at the All-Girl Finals in Tulsa, Okla., where she roped both ends, breakaway roped and ran barrels all on a home-grown mare she calls “Oddie.” That was the last time she competed at the Finals, but in some ways, it seemed her story had come full circle. Honestly, that’s just the beginning.

Judy grew up competing in junior and then high school rodeos and after putting herself through college on a rodeo scholarship she took a job teaching school in Oakdale, Calif. Circa 1978, her niece came to visit and they were looking for a horse to borrow. Ozzie Gillum had recently relocated to Oakdale to start his career as a commercial cattle buyer and had a solid rope mount he wasn’t using much.

Left: Driftwood-bred horses graze at the Gillum’s OJ Ranch in Farmington, Calif.

“Because of that horse we got acquainted,” recalled Ozzie. “I got to going over and roping with them, things got pretty thick and the rest is history.”

Shortly after they got together, the Gillums were presented with an opportunity they couldn’t resist.

“In the early ’80s, our friend, AT Spence, had bought some horses off Robert Ellsworth. We got to talking and the next thing we knew we had a loan paper for five years,” Judy explained. “We ended up with the stallion Mr Bar Truckle and four Driftwood mares, and that’s where our breeding program started.”

They settled on the OJ Ranch in Farmington, Calif., and Mr Bar Truckle remained their prominent sire for a breeding program that would span more than three decades.

“We found that place and it was pretty isolated,” explained Ozzie. “It had a big, pretty creek and lots of grass and that’s what we needed to run all them horses.”

Ozzie continued his career as a cattle buyer for 40 years before retiring, but on the side they produced some great foundation-bred rope horses. Team ropers—including Jake Barnes, Rube Woolsey, Walt Woodard, Russell “Smiley” Cardoza, Bryan Anderson and Mark Simon—along with barrel racer Nellie Williams, have all competed on their horses at the WNFR. But the most legendary horse to come off the OJ Ranch was Supai Drifter. The docile buckskin better known as “Ike” became Clay O’ Brien Cooper’s signature mount.

“Even before we ended up with Mr Bar Truckle we had been buying his colts,” explained Judy. “We had already figured out how good they were. Ike was one we bought from AT. He was loaded on a cattle truck headed from Arizona to California. We unloaded him and Ozzie put him in a stock trailer. Laura Farnsworth Jones was living with us at the time and taking a colt breaking class. We went to look at him and he was strong and feisty. Oz looked at her and said, ‘Indian,’—that’s what he liked to call her—‘What do you think?’ She said, ‘I’ll be riding him in two days.’ And she was.

“Ike was a very unique horse. He was so gentle, but would blow up at the littlest thing,” continued Judy. “One time, leaving an arena, he kicked a white Styrofoam cup and had it pawed to the ground before you could even turn around. You would ride him around, pack a little kid on him, and think there’s no way. But when those gates cracked, he was a bullet.

“He always stretched. He would go completely down in the front end and stretch and stretch. We always felt that was one of the reasons he stayed sound all those years.”

“He had a human mind, that horse,” recalled Ozzie. “Clay started trying to buy him as a 4-year-old and every time he’d come out to the place, or I’d see him, he’d tell me to do this, or do that. One summer, they stopped in and we were getting ready to rope. Clay asked who I was going to ride and I said Ike. He told me, ‘No. I’m riding Ike. You ride something else.’ He and Jake roped about five or six steers and he looked at me and said, ‘Today’s the day he’s going with me,’ and he took him.

“I told Clay, ‘Here’s the deal. It’s the middle of May and the BFI will be in June. You can take him for 30 days and I get 20 percent when you win on him. After 30 days you give me my money or my horse.’ That weekend I think he won the US Open roping in Albuquerque and won Clovis. On Tuesday I got a check for the full price.”

Cooper rode Ike for 12 years. He won the 1992 and ’94 championships, set the 10-steer arena record on him at the Finals and won the George Strait, Houston, Cheyenne and the USTRC Finals. When Ike turned 22, Cooper retired him to the lush pastures of the OJ Ranch.

“It was full circle,” said Cooper. “We go way back. I’ve known Judy and her family since I was a small kid. Through the years, we’ve had a great friendship. I always stayed with them when we went to the spring rodeos, and we traded lots of horses. As fate would have it, I had a couple horses get crippled and I really needed a horse just about the time Ozzie got Ike real solid. I bought him from them and went right on. So many special moments in my career were on that horse.”

Judy Gillum and Vivian Robinson were one of the first teams to qualify for the 2015 National Nine Finale held at Rancho Rio in Wickenburg, Ariz., and were also one of the first teams to qualify for this year’s inaugural National Eight Finale.

ROPES GALORE

Judy and Ozzie always welcomed rodeo cowboys and even raised the occasional wayward kid.

“It’s just been an amazing life. We’ve been so fortunate,” said Judy. “So many young people have shown up on our doorstep and we’ve been able to take them in and nurture them. Ozzie was really hard on them, but when they’d leave our place they were horsemen.”

Eventually, the relationships they forged through the years started to pay off for the Gillums in other ways.

Whenever the guys would stop and stay, Judy liked to help herself to ropes right out of Jake Barnes’ rope bag.

“Jake told me one day if I’d quit stealing his ropes, he’d get us a rope dealership,” Judy laughed. “At the time, Jake and Clay were using and endorsing Gator Ropes, so with the help of Judy Wagner (the company’s former President and CEO and the current Vice President of Marketing for Montana Silversmiths) we developed Ropes Galore—a traveling rope concession.”

As the industry evolved, Ropes Galore eventually became the leading Classic Ropes dealer and maintained that status for many years. Later, Judy even partnered with Callaway Ropes to create her own rope: the Gilllum Goodie.

Most of those guys had eaten at my dinner table and roped my steers, so when I asked them to help, they couldn’t tell me no.”

- Judy Gillum

“We traveled all over the country for probably 20 years before selling to Jimmy Pfeffer, who’s still running it today.”

For years, the Gillums tried relentlessly to get Ropes Galore into Cowboy Christmas, the trade show held annually during the WNFR, but were never accepted. When they got wind that Chris Woodruff of Group W Productions was starting Country Christmas at the Sands Expo Convention Center, they recognized an opportunity.

“One night, about 2 a.m., Oz told me I needed to put on a dummy roping at that new trade show. That would give us visibility and help get the show off the ground. I made Oz call Chris because I was never any good at negotiating. That year, we started the World Championship Dummy Roping. All the rope companies, all the saddle companies, everyone jumped in and did amazing things.

“It was a very special time,” said Judy.

“I tried to make every child feel special. My main deal was to let those kids get close to the guys. Most of those guys had eaten at my dinner table and roped my steers, so when I asked them to help, they couldn’t tell me no.”

She kept the dummy roping running like clockwork for 17 years before stepping away. Now in its 21st year, it’s still one of the industry’s most sought-after dummy roping championships. Judy can count more than 15 cowboys who had once roped at her dummy roping who went on to compete at the WNFR, including Brandon Beers, Russell Cardoza and the Adams boys.

CHANGING TIDES

In 2012, Judy and Ozzie Gillum decided it was time to get out of the breeding business for good.

“It’s like quitting smoking,” Ozzie laughed. “You have to do it all at once or you won’t quit.”

At the time they were still standing one stallion, Ojs Future by White Lightning Ike, an own son of Driftwood Ike. Ironically, they sold Ojs Future along with their remaining broodmares to Cezanne Baker, who’s still leasing the OJ Ranch today.

“We haven’t been back since,” said Ozzie. “That stud’s first colts are about 6 years old now and just starting to be used a lot.”

Judy and Ozzie now spend their summers in Williams, Ariz., and head further south to Wittmann for the winter. They still love to have visitors, and of course they’re still riding Driftwood-bred horses. You’ll see Ozzie on his flashy blue roan “Groucho”—another horse that Clay O’Brien Cooper has borrowed from time to time. Judy’s main mount is a stud horse registered as TTC Ikes Desperado, or “Dez.”

“I actually gave a lot money for him because I thought he’d be a great breeding stallion,” said Judy. “I did a lot of advertising, but with Ozzie and I out of the breeding program he never has been bred much. Jake (Barnes) rode a buckskin mare of his. But he’s probably the most amazing horse I’ve ever ridden. He’s 18 now.”

In the winters, Judy and Ozzie make their rounds roping at some of Arizona’s hottest jackpots, including NTR events. In 2014, Judy saddled up Oddie and was one of the first teams to qualify for the inaugural National Nine Finale, heading for Vivian Robinson. As fate would have it, they were one of the first teams to qualify for the new National Eight Finale this year. While the ladies didn’t have much luck last March, they’re gearing up to rope at the $100,000 again this coming season.

“The jackpot roping just pays so much more,” said Judy, of why she’s hung up her hat from the rodeo circuit. “I feel like I can still compete in the jackpots, and I like all of them, from the World Series to the local jackpots. But Oz and I, we pretty much stay right here in Arizona. It’s home.”