Ben Johnson Sr.
Ben Johnson Sr. was born February 19, 1886, in Harrison, Arkansas; one of ten children born to Annie McCormick and James Johnson. The family moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma where Ben attended school until 5th grade when he left school after seeing cowboys in the movies. He had decided that he was going to become a cowboy. As a young roper, Ben set a world record for calf roping in 1923 and went on to set a steer roping record in 1927, with an average of 18 seconds on three steers. In 1922, 1923 and 1926, Ben Johnson took home the coveted championship at Cheyenne Frontier Days™. From the May 1941 issue of “The Ranchman”, For Horn Clancy wrote of Ben Johnson: “He is a genial fellow who has thousands of friends, fast as a streak, always the best in roping horses, was a speedy tier, and practically always in the money at all the contests he played. He is Ben Johnson, and I understand that he is so busy in the cattle business now that he seldom if ever enters rodeos, but he was the greatest roper the rodeo arena ever knew.” His family continues his tradition, competing and winning at Cheyenne.
