Cattlemen’s Days receives $210,000

Money to benefit Tough Enough to Wear Pink

There’s nothing quite like getting tickled pink by a great holiday gift.   

During the 50th annual Wrangler National Rodeo Finals held last Wednesday, December 10 in Las Vegas, the Gunnison Cattlemen’s Days Rodeo was awarded a $210,000 check from Wrangler. Cattlemen’s Days hosts the local chapter of the nationally recognized breast cancer research and awareness program Tough Enough to Wear Pink (TETWP).
The figure Wrangler donated may sound familiar:  $210,000 is the total amount Cattlemen’s Days has raised to date for the local TETWP program.  
The award came as a total surprise, says Cattlemen’s Days vice president and local TETWP chairman Jim Swaim.  
Swaim says representatives from Cattlemen’s Days go to the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) convention every year.  This year it was held the week before the National Rodeo Finals.
“We went out there for five days and came home a couple days later,” Swaim says.  “Well, last Tuesday night Wrangler called me and said they’d like to do a presentation at the National Rodeo Finals.  I said ‘Really? We just got home.’”
“We jumped on a plane and went back to Vegas… They took us down in the middle of the rodeo arena. They talked about Gunnison, Crested Butte and the whole valley and the efforts this community has made to raise funds for Tough Enough to Wear Pink. So they said they were going to match what we’ve done over the last three years. Lo and behold, this check comes out for $210,000.”   
Cattlemen’s Days president Kim Barz says the donation is not the first measure of support from Wrangler.  “First they’d give us 500 bucks to buy our tickets out to the convention. Then it got to be $1,000.” Concerning the award last Wednesday, Barz says, “Wow… We were shocked beyond words.”
Barz never thought the local TETWP chapter would earn so much recognition. “No way. I never knew it would come this far,” he says.    
Barz says one of his biggest goals while attending numerous PRCA conferences was to have Cattlemen’s Days upgraded from a “small rodeo” to a “medium outdoor rodeo,” which can draw a larger cash purse and elite rodeo competitors.  “This is just as good, or better,” Barz says.  
In 2008 Cattlemen’s Days earned $51,000 to support TETWP, putting them in second place next to the Freemont County Fair in Wyoming, with $61,000 in yearly fundraising.   
But Swaim says over the course of the program’s history, “As far as total fundraising we are the number one rodeo.”    
The top non-rodeo fundraiser was sponsored by a college football team.  This year the New Mexico State University Aggies raised $850,000 for Cowboys for Cancer Research and TETWP.  
Perhaps even more impressive, in just four years, between rodeos and special events all around the country, the national TETWP program has raised $5 million.  Some of the funds go to breast cancer research to find a cure.  But in most cases, the funds raised stay right in the community.    
That’s certainly the case for Gunnison. “It goes right back into the community to keep doing what we’re doing now,” Swaim says. That includes breast cancer awareness and education, financial support, screenings and equipment. As of January 1, 2008, the local TETWP chapter had helped with 55 mammograms and ultrasounds and one biopsy, and provided assistance to three families of breast cancer survivors.
In July 2007, TETWP assisted the Western State College volleyball team in providing a breast cancer awareness clinic for hundreds of young women across the state.   
In October 2007, TETWP presented the Gunnison Valley Hospital with a check for $27,000 to upgrade GVH to a digital technology platform that will complement and enhance mammography in the area.
Also in the same month, in an effort to gain publicity and raise awareness of the program, the local TETWP displayed the world’s largest pink ribbon on the flanks of Tenderfoot Mountain in Gunnison (a.k.a. W Mountain).
Now with a hefty amount of extra money available, and in response to the struggling economy, Swaim says the group may also start a program that helps cancer patients with non-medical expenses such a food and gas.  Swaim says they’ll be sending out more information on that program around Valentine’s Day.
Wrangler is the title sponsor of the national TETWP program.  TETWP was started in 2004 by breast cancer survivor Terry Wheatley and former Wrangler marketing and special events director Karl Stressman, who is now director of the PRCA.   
Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer among women in the nation and it is rising in men. Of the 220,000 victims of breast cancer each year, 48,400 patients will not survive.
More information about Cattlemen’s Days and TETWP can be found at www.cattlemensdays.com/tetwp.htm.