A tribute to a Real Man From Snowy River.  "At the age of sixteen Pete was competing across Australia in bareback, saddle bronc, and steer riding" Texas Based ‘Th West of th World’   Hennessy Custom Rodeo Equipment to:  Rodeo Equipment Catalog Parade and Show Saddles click To:Pete Hennessy  Cowboy Artist Chaps and Article chaps, saddles, and bareback rigs. Hennessy bareback rigs are popular world wide. 12 World Championships have been won on his rigs. Pete says, "Having twelve world champion PRCA cowboys certainly has helped bring me rodeo customers.  Colorado cowboy Bruce Ford was bareback world champion in the PRCA five times and Marvin Garrett from South Dakota is four time bareback PRCA world champion.  Both of these men and their achievements  have helped promote my gear." Pete’s work is on display in the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame in    Colorado Springs and the Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City.  To Contact Pete 903 568 4218  email petehennessy@earthlink.net

Hennessy Bareback Rigging Custom made to fit the individual hand. Used by numerous Champions.  12 World Champions  & numerous   Australian titles won with them. The Rigging sits high   at the front on horse.  Available XL, Roo Runner,   Super Pro, Roo 2, XLPR Cut Out base. Personal after sales & problem service.

Hennessy Bareback Gloves   The palm piece is padded in vulnerable areas and lace   up for comfort and security. Gloves also available plain. Used by both Australian and World Champion Bareback riders. All custom  made.

Texas - Australian saddle maker, Texas resident, craftsman, and custom rodeo equipment maker to twelve PRCA world champions.  This saddle maker stresses the importance of custom fit in relationship to both rider and horse.  The horse being first. To Contact Pete 903 568 4218  email petehennessy@earthlink.net

Pete Hennessy was born the son of a railroad man in the “Silver City of the South Pacific” Sydney Australia. In the era of Pete’s childhood bakeries and dairies still delivered milk and bread in insulated horse drawn wagons. The clip clopping of the clydesdale’s hooves up the street would send young Pete running to the curb. The deliverymen would place him on the back of the horses and with great pride he would follow the route. The “horse crazy” boy found himself a job and with saved earnings bought his first horse at the age of fourteen. He worked long hard hours in order to purchase feed and tack.
 It was during a traveling Wild West Show that Pete got his first taste of rodeo. Under the big top tent, he climbed on a bull and was promptly thrown over the fence. Pete was hooked. He joined “The Metropolitan Rough Riders”. At the age of sixteen he was competing across Australia in bareback, saddle bronc, and steer riding. Needing to supplement his rodeo winnings he went to work for J.P. Talty a famous Australian saddle maker. The ninety six year old craftsman shared his skills with Pete and taught him a trade. The Quarter horse was coming on the scene and the American influence was producing an Australian interest in western saddles. With an adventurous spirit and a bit of wonder lust Pete sought advice from the US Embassy. He wanted to come to America, learn to make the saddles and then return to Australia. The Embassy workers told him that US regulations wouldn’t allow him to learn a new trade in the United States.
  The feisty twenty three year old took pen in hand and wrote a fiery letter to President Richard Nixon. He asked why Aussies could fight along side Yanks in Vietnam, but couldn’t learn a trade in America making western saddles. In two months Pete had a visa. The determined young man crossed the ocean. He competed in rodeos and worked in saddle shops in Texas and Idaho. He used his Australian cowboy skills working on the Hunt Brothers Ranch in Eastern Texas.
At a rodeo Pete ran into cowboy equipment and spur maker Bob Blackwood. Bob offered Pete a job building bronc saddles and bareback riggings. Pete estimates he built 1500 Blackwood riggings in less than three years. Wanting to be his own boss he opened a little shoe repair shop. Offering to purchase new equipment, rodeo notables Neal Gay and his son Donnie lured Pete back into the rodeo equipment business. With the equipment, Pete opened a new shop and built bareback riggings for the Gay’s until he could repay the loan.
 In the early eighties IPRA Champion Bobby Cooper and PRCA Champs Bob and Chuck Logue asked Pete to build a new rig for them. Combining Pete’s knowledge and the rider’s advice a new style rigging was born. Countless cowboys endorse the Hennessy rigging including legends Bruce Ford (5 times World Champion) and “Marvelous” Marvin Garrett (4 times World Champ). Wayne Herman and Mark Garrett have also claimed World titles using Hennessy riggings. In 1995 thirteen of the fifteen NFR bareback riders used Pete’s rigging. Today Cleve Schmidt hopes to be riding Pete’s rig in the 2004 NFR.
Besides making rodeo equipment and chaps Pete builds working cowboy stock saddles and of late has been creating beautifully tooled California style, silver adorned, parade saddles. He expresses his artistic side painting on bull skulls and designing custom leather items. Pete’s work is on display in the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame in Colorado Springs and the Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City.
 

Pete is easing back to his first love - saddle making and has some good hands to help to tool and build his saddles and along with his friend and saddle partner, Tom Stevens. They are producing some fine parade and show saddles.  to: More Saddle Pictures     To Contact: Pete 903 568 4218                   email petehennessy@earthlink.net To Contact:  Tom Stevens  800 889 5546  Email tom@tom-stevens.com

 Pete says, “We’ve also started a western decor shop selling cowhide rugs and related products.  We called this shop ‘Th West of th World’ and it’s growing monthly, especially our custom tooled leather products including Bible covers and belts, etc.”

Bruce Ford Colorado Cowboy     This week's Hall of Fame profile is bareback rider Bruce Ford, inducted in 1993.  A trademark riding style of feet high up for greater leg extension with his riding arm  absorbing the horse's movement separated Bruce Ford of Kersey, Colo., from other  bareback riding contestants. That, and shattering every record in the event - all-time  bareback riding earnings leader; the first cowboy won win $100,000 in a single  season in one event (1982); most Wrangler National Finals Rodeo bareback riding  qualifications (19); and a share of the most world championship bareback riding titles  (5 - 1979-80, 1982-83, 1987).     Ford, who joined the RCA in 1972, has been the bareback riding champion at  most every major rodeo in North America Bruce Ford  Cont.    more Bruce Ford Colorado Cowboy

Marvin Garrett Four-time World Champion Bareback Rider Marvin Garrett holds the record for most money earned by a bareback rider in a single year. In 1995, Garrett won $156,733 en route to the world title.  Marvin Garret cont.