08/13/2026
When Little Britches Rodeo Came to Massena
There is something about small towns, summertime and rodeos that just seems wholesome and American.
In the summer of 1961, Massena took on something that might have seemed ambitious for a small southwest Iowa town: hosting the Iowa State Championship Little Britches Rodeo.
There was just one problem.
Massena didn't exactly have a rodeo arena.
So, just as any close-knit Iowa town would do, the community built one.
Newspaper coverage from the time documented preparations underway for the championship rodeo, with local volunteers constructing bucking chutes, corrals and other facilities needed for the event. Burton Hood, chairman of the rodeo committee, summed up the town's determination with a bit of humor, telling a reporter that Massena had “everything except a hitching rail” — and that before it was over, they might have that, too.
They weren't planning on doing anything halfway, either. In a 1961 World-Herald article, Massena Chamber of Commerce president Donald Henkenius summed up the town's plans simply:
“We're trying to make it a whing-ding!”
And apparently, they did.
The rodeo became part of summertime in Massena for years to come.
Little Britches gave young cowboys and cowgirls an opportunity to compete in many of the same events associated with traditional rodeo. Depending on age and division, contestants competed in events that included bronc and steer riding, calf roping, barrel racing, pole bending and goat tying.
And these weren't necessarily highly trained show horses hauled in from expensive barns.
Looking back years later, Massena's Colleen Curry — now Colleen Wilbur of Macedonia — remembered that local kids often competed on horses their own families had raised and trained.
“Most of us couldn't afford expensive show horses,” she recalled.
That may be one of the best descriptions of what made Massena's Little Britches Rodeo special. It was rooted in the agricultural community surrounding it — farm kids, their horses, their families and a town willing to put in the work to give them a place to compete.
What began with preparations for a state championship rodeo in 1961 became a Massena tradition.
Just how long that tradition lasted is one piece of the story we're still working to document.
Our museum collection includes photographs, programs, ribbons, newspaper clippings and a list of Massena Little Britches queens stretching from 1961 through at least 1980. We haven't yet established when the final Little Britches Rodeo was held in Massena — perhaps someone in our community can help us answer that question.
And while the rodeo is no longer held in Massena today, Little Britches itself is far from gone. The National Little Britches Rodeo Association continues today, carrying on the youth rodeo tradition that once had a very special home right here in Massena.
Massena's connection to that national story would become bigger than anyone standing beside that newly built arena in 1961 might have imagined.
And one local cowgirl would find herself right in the middle of it.
Stay tuned for part two of our rodeo story series next week!
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Check out the picture of Massena'a 1st Little Britches Rodeo contestants on August 13, 1961: Left to right, back row: Rita Amdor, Jackie Coughlin, Colleen Curry, John Curry, Judy Shaw, Mary Eblen, Jerry Loghrey. Front row: Judy Scott, Bill Amdor, Janet Neal, Tim Fay, Elaine Amdor, Jackie Calkins, Max Fay, Ron Scott, Tim Moore, Bob Miller, Tom Templeton, Larry Neal, Rich DeVore, Wade Marsh, Bill Templeton.
