Exhibitions

Soul Circuit: Juneteenth Rodeos in Texas

Rodeo legend Taylor Hall, known professionally as Bailey’s Prairie Kid, takes one of his last rides. After competing in more than four hundred rodeos, Hall retired at age fifty. Photo by Sarah Bird, 1978.

In the late 1970s, a time when rodeo competitors with ranch backgrounds were more the rule than the exception, Black communities throughout Texas organized local rodeos for cowboys and cowgirls outside of the mainstream, white-sponsored circuits. Known as the "Soul Circuit," this thriving network of small-town rodeos played a crucial role in perpetuating and sustaining the more than two-hundred-year lineage of Black cowboys in America. These jubilant occasions, particularly Juneteenth rodeos, celebrated fellowship, community, and victories both in and out of the arena.

Exhibition

This exhibition features forty-three dynamic black-and-white photographs that take viewers along the full morning-to-late-night arc that constituted a Juneteenth rodeo.

Soul Circuit: Juneteenth Rodeos in Texas is based on the book Juneteenth Rodeo by photographer Sarah Bird, organized by the Neill-Cochran House Museum, and presented in partnership with Humanities Texas.

Exhibition Format

Wall-hanging

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Publicity Materials

Press release

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