09/10/2026
He rode a wild cow at a small competition in Battiest, Oklahoma, at seventeen years old, with no idea it was the first step toward a title nobody had ever held before him. Ten years later, Todd Whatley became the very first World Champion All-Around Cowboy in the history of professional rodeo.
Todd Whatley was born in 1920 in Rufe, Oklahoma. His rodeo career began the way so many great ones do — on a dare, on a wild animal, at a small-town competition most record books never bothered to remember. By 1945 he was already winning bull riding titles at two of the biggest rodeos in the country, Houston and Cheyenne — proof the raw talent from that first ride had turned into something real.
Then, in 1947, everything changed for the sport itself. Whatley won the World Steer Wrestling Championship that year, and because he'd earned more prize money across two or more events than any other cowboy in the country, the brand-new Rodeo Cowboys Association awarded him the first-ever World Champion All-Around Cowboy title in the organization's history. Rodeo didn't have an all-around champion before Todd Whatley. Then it did, and his name was the first one ever attached to it.
Then he kept proving it wasn't a fluke. He added titles at Phoenix, winning steer wrestling in 1948 and bull riding in 1952. He won ba****ck riding and steer wrestling both at Houston in 1952. Then, in 1953, he added a third world title to his collection — the World Champion Bull Rider crown — becoming one of the rare cowboys in that era's early history to master roughstock and timed events at the very highest level simultaneously.
His speed matched his versatility. In 1955, competing in Marietta, Oklahoma, Whatley posted a 2.4-second steer wrestling run with the barrier — a mark that stood as one of the fastest times in the event's history for over two decades before anyone matched it.
Off the arena floor, he shaped the sport's governance too. Whatley served on the Rodeo Cowboys Association's Board of Directors as the bull riding representative from 1952 through 1957, helping guide the organization that would eventually become today's PRCA through some of its earliest, most formative years. He retired from competition in 1956, splitting his time afterward between running his own ranch and working as a rodeo judge — staying inside the sport that had made him a legend, just from a different seat.
Inducted into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in 1955 while still active in the sport. Todd Whatley passed away in June 1966, not long after competing in a rodeo in Hugo, Oklahoma.
A seventeen-year-old on a wild cow in Battiest, Oklahoma. Ten years later, the first man in rodeo history to be crowned World Champion All-Around Cowboy. Every all-around title chased since has traced its roots back to the standard Todd Whatley set first.
Todd Whatley 🤠🐂🏆
