ProRodeo legend Larry Mahan Passes Away

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3. Larry Mahan, the Elvis of Rodeo, Is Dead at 79

Larry Mahan, the Elvis of Rodeo, Is Dead at 79

His eight championships made him a legend to his fans. His mod style, swashbuckling lifestyle and flirtations with Hollywood made him a star.



Larry Mahan competing in Oklahoma City in 1974. “Football had Joe Namath, boxing had Muhammad Ali and rodeo had Larry Mahan,” said a fellow member of the National Rodeo Hall of Fame.Credit...Associated Press

By Alex Williams
May 18, 2023

Larry Mahan, an eight-time rodeo world champion and swashbuckling showman who was once called “rodeo’s first matinee idol,” and who brokered that reputation into side careers as a Hollywood actor, a country singer and a purveyor of must-have cowboy boots, died on May 7 at his home in Valley View, Texas. He was 79. ... Bobby Steiner, a friend and a fellow member of the National Rodeo Hall of Fame, said the cause was bone cancer.

Even without his oft-noted rock-star swagger, Mahan (pronounced MAY-han) would have qualified as a titan of the sport. Competing in bull riding, saddle bronc riding and bareback riding, he won six World All-Around Cowboy championships in the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, including five in a row from 1966 to 1970. ... He added another in 1973, and he also won world bull-riding championships in 1965 and 1967.

Ah, but the swagger. Mahan emerged as a new-breed competitor in the mod 1960s and the breezy 1970s. ... “With his flared double-knit slacks and Cassini shirts,” The Austin American-Statesman observed in 1971, he was “the antonym of the old cowhand from the Rio Grande bit.”

He climbed onto bulls and broncs wearing shoulder-brushing locks, as well as silk shirts and chaps in a rainbow of colors. Away from the arena, he carried himself like the star he was — tooling around in a Jaguar, traversing the country in his twin-engine Cessna, appearing as Johnny Carson’s guest on “The Tonight Show.” Some likened him to Elvis Presley.

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Branching into Western wear, he developed a line of cowboy togs including signature boots that became as coveted among lonesome-trail types as prime Air Jordans are among sneakerheads. (Josh Brolin’s character asks for a pair of Larry Mahans, size 11, when shopping for fresh clothes in the 2007 film “No Country for Old Men.”) ... He also made his matinee-idol reputation at least a tad literal, studying acting in Los Angeles and appearing in “The Honkers,” a 1972 rodeo drama starring James Coburn and Slim Pickens; “Sixpack Annie,” a racy 1975 drive-in special; and “The Good Old Boys,” a star-studded 1995 television western directed by and starring Tommy Lee Jones. {snip} Perhaps his biggest mark on popular culture came in 1973, when he was the subject of “The Great American Cowboy,” which won the Academy Award for best documentary feature.

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