Long Live Cowboys

Long Live Cowboys, Wrangler’s marketing is all over the television in the first week of December during a tradition that takes place for the 10 nights that has lasted for 60 years. The toughest cowboys and cowgirls all make their way to Las Vegas, Nevada for the National Finals Rodeo, a tradition that most of the western world takes part of and Brinegar family loves to watch every year. Each round the entire family stays up to marvel at how the bulls get stronger, and the horses get faster and more powerful, or how the athletes learn new ways to help give them a competitive edge.

In the western world tradition is rich and deep, take Saddle Bronc riding, first done by the cowboys of the west to see who could ride and tame the wildest horses. Even roping, it’s not done just for fun, since the beginning of time there is always that one calf that needs to be caught and roping is the fastest way that the Cowboys could get the job done.

Cowboys have been around for hundreds of years and every day they feel the pressure of new advancements that seem to threaten the way of life that the Cowboys love. In the late 1800’s barbed wire closed the prairie making the once king cattle drives come to an end. The squeeze shoot ended the old days of roping and dragging calves for treatment. Ear tags and freeze branding have begun to take over the hot iron branding. Now I don’t see all of these things as bad, but a tradition was or is being broken when times change and like anything people don’t always like that.

In farming, ranching, and FFA the same thing is still happening today as the younger generation is beginning to take over GPS, new recordkeeping systems, or new thoughts on how to make our organization better are always being thought of. Grandparents are usually driven up a wall as these times change as they try to hold on to the tradition and doing something the way they did. Greenstar and new planters have helped make our job in the spring faster and more efficient even though its more complicated and can be hard to run the computers in the planters. Today we use the computer and Exel sheets to keep track of medical records keeping them neat and easy to read whenever there’s a sick animal but is a step that makes my father uncomfortable when he can easily just write it down. Even FFA has hit these new ways with an organization that is made of over 670,000 members from all over this nation we are always changing things to help make our organization more well-rounded for all students. But can we do this without losing the tradition that has built our organization?

Just like that advertisement, Long Live Cowboys, tradition is carried on through the group that works to keep it true and alive. In our changing times, of course, we don’t always want to move away from a tried and true method of doing something because of the benefits that we haven’t seen yet. We as FFA members hold the Future Farmers of America in us every time we zip up that iconic blue jacket with the letters FFA stitched on. We know that we began our organization 91 years ago because of Farming and if it wasn’t for farming, we wouldn’t have agriculture and our organization today. Like the times that change with the new technology we can keep the past alive just like the NFR has, we can use our traditions as a way to help teach the younger generation about the past and how we have gotten here today. Although it seems scary that our traditions are being threatened it's up to each of us to help pass those traditions on because through us they will be told, passed on and lived out just like the cowboy way from years ago.

Long Live Cowboys, Long Live Tradition,

2018-2019 Iowa FFA State President

Chase "CD" Brinegar