Alice Greenough Orr
{{Use mdy dates|date=September 2019}}
{{Infobox person
|image =
| name = Alice Greenough Orr
| birth_date = {{birth date|1902|3|17}}
| birth_place = Red Lodge, Montana, US
| death_date={{death date and age|1995|8|20|1902|3|17}}
| death_place=Tucson, Arizona, US
|occupation = Rodeo performer and manager
|awards=National Cowboy Hall of Fame
}}
Alice Greenough Orr (March 17, 1902 – August 20, 1995), was an internationally known rodeo performer and rodeo organizer who was inducted into the Rodeo Hall of Fame, the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame, and the Montana Cowboy Hall of Fame. She has been described as "hands down the first rodeo queen."
Background
Alice Greenough Orr was born in 1902 and raised on a ranch near Red Lodge, Montana, where she learned to train horses. She had a particular aptitude for staying on bucking horses, and as a result, her father gave her his most difficult animals to train. Orr first rode a bucking horse in rodeo competition at Forsyth, Montana, when the cowboys competing at the event dared her to do it. Orr quit school when she was 14 and for three years delivered mail on horseback along a {{convert|35|mi|abbr=on}} route. Orr sought to become a forest ranger, but the end of World War I foreclosed such work for women because of the large number of soldiers returning from the war.{{cite news|title=Alice Orr, 93, Top Bronc Rider and Rodeo Star|newspaper=The New York Times|last=McG. Thomas Jr|first=Robert|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/24/obituaries/alice-orr-93-top-bronc-rider-and-rodeo-star.html?pagewanted=1|date=August 24, 1995|access-date=July 30, 2011}} Instead, she married Ray Cahill and had two children.
Career
{{quote|We came from a great era. We called ourselves the 'Wild Bunch.'|Alice Greenough OrrExhibit at National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas}}
After her first marriage ended, she worked at a boarding house, then turned to a career in rodeo, both in competitive and exhibition events. Her interest in bronc riding began in 1929, when she and her sister, Marge Greenough Henson (1908–2004), answered an advertisement from Jack King's Wild West Show. In 1936, Orr joined with other rodeo cowboys who sought protection from financial exploitation and better pay for their accomplishments. She became a foundling member of the group which became the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association. Greenough Orr was four times the women's world saddle bronc champion, and in Australia, won the women's buck-jumping competition in Melbourne, Victoria twice.Lecompte, 102 As performers, the Greenough sisters rode saddle broncs, did trick riding and even did some bull riding. The two sisters, along with their brothers, Bill and Thurkel ("Turk"), were collectively called the "Riding Greenoughs".{{cite web|url= http://www.rodeocountry.org/catherinedevinerodeo.htm|title=Catherine "Lilbit" Devine, "Rodeo's Renegade Roses"|publisher=rodeocountry.org|access-date=December 23, 2009}}
In the 1940s, she paired with a long-time friend, Joe Orr (1905–1978), and they created their own show, the Greenough-Orr Rodeo, which toured the US and Canada. The couple married in 1958.LeCompte, p. 139 Their rodeo put on the first women's barrel racing events, and Greenough Orr is credited with inventing the competition. She also performed exhibitions of saddle bronc riding, an event that had been discontinued on the women's rodeo circuit. Greenough Orr performed in forty-six states, and notably appeared at Boston Garden and at Madison Square Garden. She also toured Australia and Europe, and when she visited the United Kingdom, she was once invited for tea with the Queen.It is unclear if the queen is Elizabeth II or her mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the wife of George VI of the United Kingdom, later known as the "Queen Mother".
Greenough Orr agreed to any number of commercial endorsements, including some for cigarettes even though she did not smoke. She did some stunt riding in film and television. Her appearances included the 1937 film "The Californians", and the 1970s-1980s television series, Little House on the Prairie.{{cite web|url=http://www.montanacowboyfame.com/151001/256138.html|title=Alice Greenough|publisher=montanacowboyfame.com|access-date=September 6, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120326174843/http://www.montanacowboyfame.com/151001/256138.html|archive-date=26 March 2012|url-status=dead}} She retired from rodeo riding in 1954 at age 52, but occasionally did movie and television work until she was 80. Her last public appearance on a horse occurred in 1992 when she rode in a parade in Red Lodge.
Legacy
Greenough Orr lived in Tucson, Arizona in retirement, where she died in 1995. Among her accomplishments, she was in the first group of women inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame in 1975.{{Cite news|url=http://www.cowgirl.net/portfolios/alice-greenough-orr/|title=Alice Greenough Orr |work=Cowgirl Hall of Fame & Museum|access-date=April 19, 2017}}{{cite web|url= http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/lbn05|title=National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame|publisher=tshaonline.org|access-date=September 6, 2011}} She was inducted into Rodeo Hall of Fame in 1983,{{cite web |title=Alice Greenough |url=https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/rodeo-hall-of-fame/5121/ |website=National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum |access-date=6 April 2021}} and the Montana Cowboy Hall of Fame in 2010. She was also listed as one of the "100 Most Influential Montanans of the [20th] Century."
References
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Sources
- {{Cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=ApBAVdQBLpEC&q=Alice+Greenough+Orr&pg=PA139|title=Cowgirls of the Rodeo: Pioneer Professional Athletes|isbn=9780252068744|access-date=December 23, 2009|last1=Lecompte|first1=Mary Lou|year=2000|publisher=University of Illinois Press }}
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Category:Sportspeople from Billings, Montana
Category:Sportspeople from Tucson, Arizona
Category:People from Red Lodge, Montana
Category:American stunt performers
Category:American sports businesspeople
Category:Ranchers from Montana