Tough times in old Cheyenne

Iggy

Iggy

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It is Frontier Days in old Cheyenne this week. One of the activities is an air show at the airport and the Thunderbirds do their thing too.

Now I live on the highest point in Cheyenne and about a mile from the airport and 1 1/2 from the rodeo arena.

Traditionally all of the planes arriving for the airshow come in during the rodeo. The fellers flyin' them planes just have to make a couple of orbits around the town so that everbody knows they are here.

Well them orbits take them right down the ridge I live on. Them ol boys know that if they go any further out, nobody can see them for the trees along my ridge.

They use my ridge as a reference point and come right over the house. I mean right over the house!!!

Yesterday it was a F-80 Shooting Star, a couple of Warthogs and and Mig 15. I've seen a terrific variety of ol time planes go over close enough to rattle the winders. B-25's, Stealth fighters, F-86's, F-4's, P-51's and I don't know whut all.
Even had a B-52 do a low pass fly over one time. He din't land but everybody knowed he had been here.

Well, this morning I'm sittin' out in the sunroom enjoyin' a nice breeze. The Thunderbirds are doin' their thing today and they too use my ridge as perimeter for their maneuvers and they come right over the house several times. Now them boys make a racket, I can tell you for sure. Why they was so loud I couldn't even hear my surfin' music by the Ventures and the Beachboys there for a while.:(

Guess the show is over and it's time to go out to a cream can dinner at the Shrine club....:)

Yup, things is pretty rough here in old Cheyenne today....;):cool:
 
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My glass eye is shedding a few tear drops for you, Iggy.:D

Sounds like a great free show.
 
I'm not too far away in Ft. Collins, CO these days .... even this far away the place has been a mad house. Seems like everyone and their brother shows up for frontier days!!
 
nogoodnamesleft said:
I'm not too far away in Ft. Collins, CO these days .... even this far away the place has been a mad house. Seems like everyone and their brother shows up for frontier days!!
Click to expand...


Yup, Sasaberanger asked me where was a good place to eat in Cheyenne this week and I told him Ft. Collins.:cool:

It is always amazing how relatives you never heard of in your life want to come visit and renew old family ties this week...
 
My sister lives just south of Cheyenne off of College Drive and the Thunderbirds would be flying over quite low. it was like you could almost reach out and touch the planes. for a few years they would do their flying out on a deserted part of the AFB just in case if one crashed it didn't come down in town. I used to drive up from Ft. Collins for the show every year. They used to have some really good displays in years past but I heard there isn't as many planes as there used to be.
 
Yup, the air show has kinda fizzled down a bit. Those old timers are expensive to fly.

When I was a kid, the T-birds flew right over the airport. F-100s'.
Two came from opposing directions right down the runway. Really really low. After they had landed, two pilots were looking under one of the planes. Each plane had a brass thing that looked like a sharks fin sticking out below it. The one the two guys were looking at had a MUCH shorter fin than the rest of the planes. Apparently most of the fin had been ground off on the runway. The pilot looked a wee bit green for some reason.
 
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Boy this is a "hard" bunch!!;)

JimmyJ,

I've lived Cheyenne for about 10 years. I make the pilgrimage to MB at least once a week during the summer when we have critters on the ranch.

That 140 mile one way commute gits a bit old by shippin' time in the fall.

Then I git to go sit in cattle auction rings until spring.:(
 
I might have felt sorry for Iggy (yeah, right) until he got to the part about the cream can dinners. Not any more, boy. I've had a few of them dinners myself at Frontier Days and I am sure not sorry for him now - I'm jealous!
 
I ran a sporting goods store in Cheyenne back in the late '70's. Went to Frontier Days every year. I really miss being able to roam all over the state and not having to worry about trespassing (unlike Texas which has a very limited amount of public land). Hell, I even enjoyed the winters and the wind...would move back there in a heartbeat but I could never talk my wife into leaving Texas.
 
T-birds just took off outta here like turpentined cats. Weather forecast is for hail in the next few minutes. Don't think them fellers want them purty planes to get bent.;)
 
What! You get all these close passes and you do not take any PICTURES!!?? I think I need to take over your patch as you are failing to make best use of your real estate. Location, location, location and all that.:D
 
Due to the tree cover around my place, usually all I see is a fox hole view as they pass directly overhead.

I get some nice long range views but my Kodak brownie ain't much adaptable to telephoto lenses.;)
 
I was in Cheyenne I think it was 77 or 78 that year one of the planes did crash right on the rodeo grounds. No human were lost but the pilot who ejected way to late into a taco stand, the mechanic that was back seatting parachuted out with minor injuries. Some of Harry Vold's buck-en bulls were transformed into meat for the Indians.....Frontier Days employees had to build a ramp over the wreckage so it could be protected for USAF inspection....No smoking behind the chutes that year..Remember Winston used to give them things a way back in them days....Sad for the pilot that was credited with saving a lot of lives by staying in the plane till the last minute....He was a very brave guy....The Show went on....The same year one of the Chuck Wagon racers got run into a post in the arena he bought it to...That was a rough 10 days in old Cheyenne..There was a bar downtown that had a few rough days or nights, no major injuries...Can't remember the name of that there bar...Of course i didn't frequent those kind of places. NO NOT ME
 
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Ah, the last full week in July....
Hadn't been to Frontier Days since the 100th Daddy of 'em All.

Loretta and I motored out with our daughter and her fiance'
to take in the festivities and watch our son settin one in the bronc ridin.

Do enjoy the single steer ropin and crusin the vender's displays under the new grandstands.

And to think, I'm jest stuck here diggin postholes and a sweatin ;)

Later,

Su Amigo,
Dave
 
George,

That had to be the Mayflower. The whole division of Highway Patrolmen in Laramie including me got called out at 3AM to beat feet to Cheyenne and help rescue the PD and supress the rowdies at the Mayflower on night.

Talked to a Greyhound bus driver that got passed by all those patrol cars goin' flat out and he figgered one of the Minuteman Missiles must have exploded or something.:cool:

Dave, Come on out, you can help me dig a ditch!!;)
 
when I got out of the service in 1973 after 3 years in Germany I found that Frontier Days in Cheyenne was a really poor choice to get off the wagon.
 
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Iggy said:
George,

That had to be the Mayflower. The whole division of Highway Patrolmen in Laramie including me got called out at 3AM to beat feet to Cheyenne and help rescue the PD and supress the rowdies at the Mayflower on night.

Talked to a Greyhound bus driver that got passed by all those patrol cars goin' flat out and he figgered one of the Minuteman Missiles must have exploded or something.:cool:

Dave, Come on out, you can help me dig a ditch!!;)
Click to expand...

Ah the Mayflower that was it...What a place.....I was staying at the old hitching Post then. The HP was a gathering place for the entered cowboys due to the buffet and the band from Sacramento "Ricky and the Red-streaks" The really knock down drag em out was at the Mayflower...I was contracted to hire extra security for the HP by the PRCA...Hell of a off duty job!!! Worked there for 7 years along with Reno, Huston, and Denver....Good money but some shaky incidents....My PRCA contractors card got me into the events, behind the chutes where I quickly learned that pain is a way of life for those guys especially the rough stock guys......Mahan was just about ready to semi-retire and Bobby Brown and Hawk-eye along with Donnie Gay were usually on top. that year the Thunderbird crashed was a dozy from start to finish....Getting old but some great memories of things past.....Only thing I can figure was worse than being a Cheyenne Cop during Frontier days was maybe in Rock Springs...Now that is another story.. I'll admit I had some strange on and off-duty jobs....I was crazy then I guess. I guess you have rode some strange fences your self over the years..
 
I used to work with a fellow that had a house directly under the flight pattern for Laughlin AFB, a flight training center near Del Rio, TX. When I first talked to him and found that out, I told him that it must really be annoying. His response was, "No, not really, it is the sound of freedom!"
 
BE Mike said:
I used to work with a fellow that had a house directly under the flight pattern for Laughlin AFB, a flight training center near Del Rio, TX. When I first talked to him and found that out, I told him that it must really be annoying. His response was, "No, not really, it is the sound of freedom!"
Click to expand...

I would have thought his response would have been "WHAT?"
 
nogoodnamesleft said:
I'm not too far away in Ft. Collins, CO these days .... even this far away the place has been a mad house. Seems like everyone and their brother shows up for frontier days!!
Click to expand...

Iggy said:
Yup, Sasaberanger asked me where was a good place to eat in Cheyenne this week and I told him Ft. Collins.:cool:

It is always amazing how relatives you never heard of in your life want to come visit and renew old family ties this week...
Click to expand...


Good Lord... Yer Kin to SASABERANGER:eek::eek::eek::eek:..
You best skeeddadle outta town NOW!!.. Fore he drops in an. ets ya outta house and homestead..:eek::D.. and lock up yer shootin' irons..
 
ditrina said:
Good Lord... Yer Kin to SASABERANGER:eek::eek::eek::eek:..
You best skeeddadle outta town NOW!!.. Fore he drops in an. ets ya outta house and homestead..:eek::D.. and lock up yer shootin' irons..
Click to expand...

Nah we're not kinfolks, just friends. Friends is better than kin as you can choose your friends and you cain't choose your kin.

Met with Thom and Debbie this afternoon for some show and tell. That feller always has sumthin' on the burner.

You have to step lively if your gonna beat that pair on doin' nice things for folks. I ain't managed to get ahead of them yet.
 
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