The Italian Festival of McAlester, Oklahoma (USA), has been one of the finest annual events in Oklahoma since its inception in 1971. Held on Saturday and Sunday, the Festival draws thousands of visitors to the fairgrounds of the Pittsburg County Expo Center for the two-day event. Join the many thousands who enjoy delicious Italian Food in the Food Tent and the Sandwich Tent, a variety of other foods from dozens of concessionaires, live entertainment for all ages, shopping among the hundreds of vendors, craft show booths and fine arts booths.  Don't miss the most exciting weekend of Spring in the rolling hills of beautiful southeastern Oklahoma. 

This rodeo isn’t only for Oklahoma State Penitentiary rough riders--it features inmate cowboys from correctional facilities across Oklahoma and free cowboys from the IPRA. It’s where real life tough-as-nails cowpokes compete for big thrills and medium-sized bucks. Capitalizing on fear, danger and the public’s taste for spectacle, the rodeo is as American as our justice system. It features thrill-a-minute, death defying acts that we’ve all come to know and love: calf roping and bull riding, steer wrestling and barrel racing, and, of course, grandstanding. This year the rodeo will be held August 14- 15.  The Outlaw Rodeo is the largest behind the walls prison rodeo in the country. Bring the entire family to see the best IPRA cowboys in the world compete in timed events, and prisoners from around Oklahoma try their luck with bulls and broncs! This rodeo is like no other in the world and you have to make plans to see it for yourself!

McALESTER, Okla. - James Barcus has been in and out of prison for years, but the hardest time he’ll ever do was expected to come this weekend, atop a wild, bucking bronco in one of the nation’s few rodeos held behind prison walls.

“I ain’t never rode anything in my life,” said the minimum security inmate who lives next door to the maximum security Oklahoma State Penitentiary, where the public has paid to watch criminals test their toughness against angry bulls and horses for 64 years.

The Outlaw Rodeo, billed as the “World’s Largest Behind the Walls,” is a big draw in these eastern Oklahoma hills, with 12,000 people expected Friday and Saturday nights. Professionals also compete in the sanctioned event, but boosters say it’s the thrill of being inside a prison arena with convicted felons that brings the crowd.  Fri., Sept. 2, 2005

Women inmates prepare for debut at prison rodeo

The woman stood beside a tree, pressing on her lower jaw until it popped. Unmindful of the heat or the flies that buzzed or landed on her arm, which was turning purple where a fresh bruise was overlaying the yellow of an old one, or of the thin layer of skin that had peeled away when a metal cable had caught her, she watched her companions.

Her dark eyes took in her 12 teammates. Some were over by the bucking barrel, a 50-gallon drum suspended from four cables that were pulled to simulate the bucking movement of an animal. Some were helping another rider to prepare for the barrel, adjusting her helmet and spurs, while one sat on a different barrel, this one suspended by two cables that allowed it to easily slip side to side. A few rested on the back of a truck and watched the others.

“I’m in it to win,” said one of those resting. “That’s all there is to it. I’m in it to win.”

Sherrea Emrich wasn’t alone in that feeling. Each of the 13 women on the Lady Warriors rodeo team feels the same.

The women from Eddie Warrior Correctional Center will be competing in the 66th annual Oklahoma State Prison Rodeo in McAlester on Aug. 18 at 19. It’s the first time in recent memory that female inmates will be competing, but they won’t be competing in events that are traditionally considered events for females or children.

Instead, they’ll be going head to head against their male counterparts in rough stock and special events: bull riding, bronc riding, the wild horse race, bull poker, double mugging and money the hard way.

“I think it’s neat to be part of the first Eddie Warrior team,” said Rhonda Buffalo, one of three alternates on the team.

Alternates are ready to fill in at a moment’s notice if a fellow team member is unable to compete due to an injury — or a bad case of nerves. “We’ve got to be ready for anything,” Buffalo said. The competition itself, she added, “Shows we can go out of our element and do something. That’s important.”

Some of the women have never been around live animals any larger than a dog. Others have, but not in the way they soon will.

“We had some horses growing up, so I rode all the time,” said Tina Chinchilla. “I’ve never been around rodeos though.”

“I’ve got no experience, but my family’s been in it,” said team member Kendra Priest, walking over from testing her balance on the two-cable barrel. “My father was a bull rider and rodeo clown, my uncle competed. I want to see what I can do.”

“I’ve rodeod since I was able to walk,” said Cydney Morriss. “I did barrel racing, breakaway roping, pole bending, those kinds of things.” But she’s never done the types of events in which she’ll be competing next month. Morris will be among a select group who’ll try to still, saddle and ride a wild horse or pull down and tie a fully grown steer.

Elizabeth Bramwell roped calves and steers when she was younger “But this is a new deal. If I wasn’t locked up in here I wouldn’t be doing this stuff.”

One hundred eighty women initially tried out for the team. Those that remain “Ain’t playing around,” said Team Captain Monte Baker. “We never culled anyone after the first couple of days. They just quit.

“These girls won’t quit.”

Published: July 27, 2006 10:00 am  McAlester News-Capital