CREMONA - A local resident recently celebrated 60 years as a Calgary Stampede volunteer. Bruce Roy, a former Cremona school teacher, first went to the Stampede as a youngster in 1943. He joined the Draft Horses Committee in 1959 and has been involved ever since.
Roy, who still lives near Cremona, has been the announcer for the draft horse events at Stampede for 45 years and still enjoys working the microphone.
"I announce for the draft horse show, which is substantial in Calgary," said Roy. "There are the breeding classes for Belgians, Clydesdales, Percherons and Shires. There are the performance classes, which consist of carts, teams, unicorn hitches, four-horse hitches, six-horse hitches of each of the breeds and inter-breed competitions."
Roy also announced the world six-horse hitch championship, which is performed with music from members of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra at the Nutrien Event Centre.
"I also announce the youth competitions for young heavy horse exhibitors like youth decorating," he said. "There are the youth showmanship classes; there are classes for juniors, seniors and intermediates as well as youth, junior and senior carts."
Roy said the crowds for all the heavy horse events were very big this year.
"This year the crowd was such that the officials had to close the doors," he said. "The event started at 6:30 p.m. and the arena was packed at 6 p.m. and they were standing six deep in the concourse."
In the middle of the week, there was the competition for the best horse in show, which featured the brass section from the Calgary Philharmonic.
"The horses, of course, just love to perform to the music," he said. "The crowds love it too. When you see the horses in there all bathed up with their manes rolled, tails tied for safety and ribbons on them. The horses are all shod and they sparkle when they move under the lights. It's quite the sight."
Roy said he's always enjoyed watching the horses perform.
"I've been a volunteer at the Calgary Stampede for 60 years," he said. "I attended my first Stampede in 1943 with my dad and my cousin. I was six and hadn't started school yet. My dad took us from Cayley, which at that time was the world's second-largest cattle shipping station. It was during the height of the war."
Roy recalls taking the train from Cayley to Calgary and walking from the station to the exhibition grounds.
"My cousin just wanted to walk around the midway, which was pretty primitive back then compared to today," he said. "It was mostly freak shows and a few rides. I fell madly in love with the livestock exhibits and the heavy horses in particular. It became a passion of a lifetime."
He bought his first horse in 1956 while working in Fort Simpson in the Northwest Territories.
"I spent the summer up there while going to university," he said. "There was no bank and nothing to do. I couldn't spend any money. I was fascinated by draft horses so I bought a young mare that was one of the top winners at the five exhibitions that held the draft horse shows. I paid $250 for her."
He began showing his horses the year after in 1957.
"Right about when heavy horses were disappearing," he laughed. "Everyone was mechanizing their farms at that time. They delivered the mare to my dad's farm from Wetaskiwin for $10. My dad laid on the ground and laughed. He said, 'some education you're getting. Draft horses are going out of style.'"
Roy ended up joining the draft horse committee at the Stampede two years later in 1959 and has been volunteering there ever since.
"They asked me to come aboard the committee because the committee members were leaving like rats leaving a sinking ship," he chuckled. "So I joined aboard. I met with Hardy Salter, then secretary of the Canadian Percheron Association and the McKinnon brothers who owned McKinnon Ranches east of Calgary as well as Excel Packing Plant. They fought tooth and nail as members of the committee to keep the heavy horses, which we did."
Roy said there were some rough times for the heavy horses at the Stampede.
"We were shown in the back lots and by the river, so to speak, but we hung on," he said.
About 20 years ago, the committee was looking at ways to improve attendance and popularity for the heavy horse shows.
"I suggested we bring the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra in," he said. "The other committee members could hardly believe what I was saying. Don Stewart, then the ag manager, he was interested. So we ended up doing that. Now they say we're the number 1 ag exhibit at Stampede Park."
Roy is the first volunteer at Stampede to hit 60 years and, as he puts it, "I'm not ready to quit yet."
"I received a gold pin from the president and general manager of the Stampede at a committee meeting about a month ago and I thought, 'that was great.' Unbeknownst to me, the rest of the committee had it arranged that I would be honoured after the world 6-horse hitch championships in front of a massive crowd."
Roy said he was boosted up onto a show wagon and was paraded around the arena behind the 6-horse hitch world champions.
"They managed to get me up there," he said. "I went around the ring two or three times with the champions. I told them, 'for goodness sake, I'm not getting off in front of this crowd. Get me back to the barn!' It was lots of fun."
Roy continues to write about draft horses for a magazine out of Iowa.
"I'm a feature columnist for the Draft Horse Journal out of Waverly, Iowa," he said. "I write feature articles for them and the editorial and have for years. I was secretary for the Canadian Percheron Association for many years. It's been a very large part of my life and still is."
Roy's son Cameron Roy from Markerville and daughter Megan Phillips and her husband Shawn of Didsbury are carrying on the tradition of raising and showing Percherons.
