In 2011, the Texas House passed a resolution in celebration of Isora DeRacy Young’s 106th birthday, as well as her accomplishments in and out of the rodeo arena. Born on her family’s ranch near Pecos, the rodeo there was blessed to host the only two women calf ropers in history at the time in her and fellow female roper Jewel Frost Duncan.
In her motherhood years, Young worked for “the Reeves County sheriff’s department, collecting taxes with a pearl-handled revolver at her side,” the state resolution reads. But, with her daughter grown, she again returned to rodeo and traveled the country with her husband, I. W. “Dub” Young, roping and running barrels.
In 2023, the WPRA celebrated the 75th anniversary of its first Girls Rodeo Association meeting, held Feb. 28, 1948, where Young was among the 38 ranch women who arrived in San Angelo to give rodeo’s better half an official place in the arena.
Throughout September, Women in Rodeo month, we highlight the stories of women who have most impacted the sport of rodeo, as well as those who’ve lobbied alongside them for equality of opportunity. The vision of the American West has always been that of freedom, of grit and of limitless possibility, and the advocates and athletes we honor in September exemplify those values. Here’s to the Cowgirl.