Mabel Strickland, A Cowgirl For All Seasons

Mabel Strickland, A Cowgirl For All Seasons

Photo courtesy Linne Mackinzie

Mabel Strickland may have frowned upon the idea of her own daughter growing up to follow the rodeo circuit, but that didn't prevent her from being one of the best rodeo and wild west show cowgirls of all times.

 She appeared on the cover of the 1926 Cheyenne Frontier Days program in a photo featuring her as a bronc rider, smiling and waving to the crowd while atop the wild one, Stranger. 

In later years she would, along with Bonnie Gray and Bertha Blancett, found the Association of Film Equestriennes. In Rhythm Of The Range, starring Bing Crosby, Mabel did all the trick riding for Crosby who proved to be a better singer than cowboy.

The story below recounts a time when many feared she may die from injuries sustained at the famed Madison Square Garden.

Rodeo cowgirl, rodeo queen, movie queen, Mabel Strickland was the whole package. The most photographed of all the early cowgirls, Mabel was equally at home in the rodeo arena as she was on the silver screen.After winning title for the World Champion Lady Rider at the Cheyenne Frontier Days, she went on to perform in the World Series Rodeo at Madison Square Garden in New York and competed in the trick riding event with a dozen other cowboys and cowgirls. Mabel was performing a trick in which she goes under the horse's neck and grabs the saddle on the other side as the horse gallops around the arena. Somehow, she lost her grip and fell beneath the belly of the galloping horse. She was injured quite severely and newspapers reported her as "near death".

She did recover and went on to win several more championships.
Years later, Mabel established herself as a sought after movie actress and stunt woman in Hollywood. In 1936 she signed for a supporting role in the film, "Rhythm On The Range" with Bing Crosby. A set was duplicated to look like the arena at Madison Square Garden where she had been so badly injured in 1926. As Mabel walked out to the set, she fainted in front of a gate that looked just like the one where she was trampled. She was rushed to the hospital where physicians reported a hemorrhage had reapeared at the site of the old internal wound! She recovered once again and finished the movie on schedule.