58 Fun Facts About Calgary Stampede

In which month is the Calgary Stampede held every year?

July came later: the first Stampede, in 1912, opened on Labour Day, at the start of September.

How does the Calgary Stampede bill itself?

The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth was big talk from the start: in 1912 its promoter pitched backers a frontier contest on a colossal scale, with big prizes to draw the best riders and ropers.

In the Stampede's barrel racing, horse and rider circle three barrels in what pattern?

A cloverleaf, run flat out: a rider may brush a barrel, but knocking one over adds five seconds, usually enough to put a win out of reach.

Which American trick roper organised the first Stampede in 1912?

Guy Weadick was born far from the range, in Rochester, New York; after touring with Wild West shows he wanted real cowboy contests in place of their staged tricks.

What nickname was given to the wealthy cattlemen who bankrolled the first Calgary Stampede in 1912?

The Big Four were Pat Burns, George Lane, Alfred Cross and Archie McLean, who pledged $25,000 each; the show was a hit, yet Calgary saw no repeat until 1919, when they backed it again.

The first Stampede in 1912 invited riders from Canada, the United States and which other country?

Mexico was on the list because the founder wanted riders from every cattle district on the continent, and he lured them with a purse he billed as the richest rodeo had seen.

After the first Stampede in 1912, its founder staged his second a year later in which city?

Winnipeg got the 1913 Stampede because Calgary's backers saw 1912 as a one-time party; the show did not return to Calgary until 1919.

The 1919 Stampede in Calgary was staged in honour of whom?

Soldiers returning from World War I were honoured at what was billed as the Victory Stampede; it stayed a one-off, and Calgary saw no Stampede again until 1923.

Why did Calgary's Exhibition merge with the Stampede in 1923?

Falling crowds and debts had the Exhibition close to being abandoned, so its manager hired the Stampede's founder, and the combined show became a permanent annual event.

Bulldogging is another name for which Stampede rodeo event?

Steer wrestling began as Wild West showman Bill Pickett's stunt, so unlike roping and bronc riding it never came from real ranch work.

What is the official name of the Stampede's wagon-racing competition?

Rangeland Derby crews in the earliest races did not win at the finish line: they had to unhitch, pitch camp and light a fire, and the first smoke decided the winner.

At the start of a chuckwagon race, what do the outriders toss into the wagon before mounting up?

A stove goes in because the race re-enacts ranch crews breaking camp after a roundup; a crew that fails to load it takes a time penalty.

Which announcer, famed for 'and they're offfffff!', called the Stampede's wagon races for 45 years?

Joe Carbury's first love was hockey, where he called well over 1,000 games, yet his drawn-out wagon-race start made him the voice of the Stampede until he retired in 2008.

How do chuckwagon drivers sell the advertising space on their wagon covers before each Stampede?

At a tarp auction whose total Calgarians read as a gauge of the local economy: bids passed $4 million at the peak of the 2007 boom.

A bull rider at the Stampede rodeo must stay aboard for how long to earn a score?

Eight seconds earns a score, but only half of it is the rider's: judges award up to 50 points to the cowboy and up to 50 to the bull for how hard it bucks.

What does the Stampede rodeo call the final day that decides its champions?

Showdown Sunday wipes the slate clean: a week of earlier rounds only buys a place in it, and a single ride or run decides who takes each event's biggest cheque.

Most rodeo livestock comes from the Stampede Ranch, created in 1961 near which Alberta town?

Hanna's ranch runs the Stampede's 'Born to Buck' breeding program, which turns horse breeding on its head by selecting for animals that buck harder rather than gentler ones.

Which First Nations cowboy became the only Canadian champion of the 1912 Stampede by riding Cyclone?

Tom Three Persons became the first rider to stay aboard Cyclone, a bronc that had thrown more than 100 men, and the win made the Kainai cowboy one of the Stampede's first heroes.

The Treaty 7 nations' tipi encampment at the Stampede, long called the Indian Village, was renamed what in 2018?

Elbow River Camp was chosen by the tipi owners themselves: each of the 26 tipis put names forward and a vote settled it, with Treaty 7 Camp the runner-up.

Why did the Stoney people boycott the 1950 Stampede?

Free treaty-card entry ended in 1950 for all but tipi owners, so the angry Stoneys stayed away; when storms battered that year's show, a tale spread that they had danced for rain.

Which future prime minister, then a Calgary lawyer, handled the sale that gave the city the exhibition grounds in 1901?

R. B. Bennett, by one account the mortgage lender's lawyer and by another briefly the owner, passed the grounds to the city, which is why the Stampede runs on leased, city-owned land.

The Stampede parade begins the festival on which day of the week?

Friday morning's parade opens the festival, and it was a draw from the start: the first one in 1912 reportedly drew 75,000 people or more, a bigger crowd than Calgary's whole population.

Which couple officially launched the 2011 Stampede parade?

Prince William and Kate launched the parade weeks after their wedding, extending a royal habit that began when the Duke of Connaught attended the very first Stampede.

Which two Hollywood entertainers each took a turn as the Stampede's parade marshal?

Bob Hope and Bing Crosby each led the parade in the years when the Stampede courted famous names to pull crowds; Walt Disney later took the same honour.

What happened when the Stampede's founder, fired by its board in 1932, sued for wrongful dismissal?

He won a modest award: the court upheld his claim but gave him only a small sum plus legal costs, and he stayed away for 20 years until he rode in the 1952 parade as an honoured guest.

In 1919 a flying ace's failing plane, two passengers aboard, came down on top of which ride at Calgary's fair?

The merry-go-round caught him: Fred McCall lost power over the fairgrounds and set the plane down on the carousel's roof, and he and both passengers came away unhurt.

The Stampede set an attendance record that stood for twelve years while celebrating what?

Its centennial in 2012 drew 1,409,371 people, and the party coaxed Garth Brooks, who had quit full-time touring in 2001, into playing a rare concert.

What caused the first cancellation of the Stampede since it became a yearly event in 1923?

The COVID-19 pandemic ended a yearly run that neither the Depression nor wartime had broken; in 2020 the closest thing on offer was a drive-through pancake breakfast.

Two weeks before the 2013 Stampede opened, the grounds were badly damaged by what?

Flooding put nearly the whole park under water, yet crews rebuilt the track and infield in a fortnight and the gates opened on time under the rallying cry 'come hell or high water'.

What is the informal nickname of Calgary that reflects its Stampede identity?

Cowtown is a label the oil-company city grows into each July, when storefronts and office towers get cowboy paint jobs and pancake breakfasts pop up across town.

How is the Stampede's free pancake breakfast tradition said to have begun in 1923?

A wagon driver fed passers-by: chuckwagon racer Jack Morton is credited with inviting people downtown to share the breakfast cooked at his wagon, and the free meal became a yearly fixture.

The largest single Stampede pancake breakfast, which feeds tens of thousands for free, is hosted where?

Chinook Centre mall gives up its parking lot for one morning, when cooks flip free pancakes for tens of thousands of people at the city's biggest Stampede breakfast.

What was Stampede Park's saddle-roofed arena originally called when it opened in 1983?

Olympic Saddledome was built because the city's bid for the 1988 Winter Games needed a far bigger rink than it had; the NHL's Flames moved in first, and sponsors' names replaced 'Olympic' only later.

Which 1950 arena, the Flames' first home in the city, did the Saddledome replace as Calgary's top venue?

Stampede Corral was the biggest arena west of Toronto when it opened, yet by 1980 it was so small for the NHL that the Flames stayed only until the Saddledome was finished.

The Stampede's giant 1959 exhibition hall was iced over each winter for which sport?

Curling took over the hall each winter: it opened with 24 sheets of ice, and the Stampede says it doubled that to 48 within a year.

What is the large party tent that hosts country music acts all day on the Stampede grounds?

Nashville North, the Stampede's country-music party tent, swapped its walls for an open canopy in 2021, and guests had to show proof of vaccination or a negative rapid test to get in.

What is the cut-price opening night of the Stampede midway, held the evening before the parade, called?

Sneak-a-peek opens the gates the evening before the parade at a discounted admission, so visitors can try the midway rides and exhibits before the big crowds arrive.

Which Stampede grandstand troupe of singers and dancers started out in 1964 as the Calgary Kidettes?

The Young Canadians took that name in 1968, four years after forming as the Calgary Kidettes. The children's act proved such a hit that it stayed and grew into the grandstand show's headliner.

By 2019 the Stampede Showband had marched four times in which American parade?

The Rose Parade in Pasadena had the Showband in 1997, 2003, 2012 and 2019. Its route runs about nine kilometres, so the band spent months rehearsing to build the stamina to march it.

Stampede Queen hopefuls have been judged on public speaking and which other skill?

Horsemanship counted because the winners spent a year as the Stampede's ambassadors, making hundreds of appearances. Patsy Rodgers, the first queen in 1946, returned in 2008 as parade marshal.

Who fills the committees that run almost every part of the Stampede each year?

Unpaid volunteers, more than 2,000 of them, fill the committees, and the rule runs to the top: even the Stampede's board of directors serves without pay.

In 2008 the Calgary Stampede itself was inducted into which institution?

ProRodeo Hall of Fame, in Colorado Springs, inducted the Stampede in 2008 as a rodeo committee, the class it keeps for the organisers behind a great rodeo instead of the riders.

After a run of deadly chuckwagon crashes in 1986, what did the Stampede do before the 1987 show?

Rewrote the race rules: the crashes had brought calls to ban the event outright, and tougher rules were the Stampede's answer. It tightened them again in 2011, after six horses died in 2010.

Nine horses died in 2005 when a herd bound for the Stampede fell from a Calgary bridge into which river?

Bow River waters claimed nine of about 200 horses that bolted on a city bridge near the end of a trail ride to the grounds. The Stampede shelved the ride indefinitely afterwards.

Which out-of-province animal-welfare group has run ad campaigns urging the Stampede to drop calf roping?

Vancouver Humane Society ads have likened the roped calf to a baby and called the event one of rodeo's cruellest. In 2009 both of Calgary's major newspapers refused to print one.

For the 1923 Stampede, the first run jointly with the city's fair, what were Calgarians urged to do all week?

Dress in western clothes was the founder's appeal to the whole city. Merchants decorated their shopfronts too, and downtown streets were given over to the festivities for two hours every day.

Dating from 1886, the Stampede's fair is older than which of these?

The province of Alberta was created only in 1905, when the fair was 19 years old. Its founders had started it to advertise the young town and draw settlers west.

The Stampede's founder came to Calgary in 1908 to perform at which fair?

The Dominion Exhibition was a travelling federal fair that drew about 100,000 people to Calgary. One big draw, an airship flying over the grounds, ended its run by exploding.

Flores LaDue, champion trick roper at the 1912 Stampede, was what to its founder?

His wife met him on the Wild West show circuit and toured vaudeville with him as a roping act. She took the ladies' fancy roping title at that first Stampede, a champion in her own right.

For all its worldwide fame, who makes up most of the Stampede's crowd?

Calgary-area locals make up an estimated 70 per cent of the gate. Because those locals are also voters, politicians of every stripe turn up to flip pancakes at Stampede breakfasts across the city.

Stampede Wrestling, the Calgary show that aired in over 50 countries, was the launch pad for which wrestling family?

The Harts were led by Stu Hart, who founded the promotion and trained hundreds of wrestlers, among them his sons Bret and Owen, in the basement gym of the family mansion known as the Dungeon.

Which Canadian singer rode on horseback at the head of the 2025 Stampede parade as its marshal?

Shania Twain led the parade on horseback, eleven years after her last Stampede shows. She then headlined a Stampede concert the following night.

The Stampede's golden age in the 1950s followed the 1947 discovery of which landmark Alberta oil well?

Leduc No. 1 struck oil in February 1947 and set off a boom that nearly doubled Calgary's population within a decade. The newcomers, many of them American, embraced the Stampede and swelled its crowds.

When the Stampede tried to move to former military land in southwest Calgary in 1964–65, who fought the plan hardest?

Nearby residents met the plan with fierce, noisy opposition, and the bid failed in 1965. The Stampede stayed put and later spread into neighbouring Victoria Park instead.

At Aggie Days, the Stampede's free spring event for city families, what do children learn?

Where food comes from is the lesson, taught with cow-milking demonstrations and newborn farm animals that city children rarely get near. It began as a programme for urban schoolchildren.

Federal officials moved to bar First Nations people from the first Stampede in 1912; what happened next?

The government backed down about a month before opening day, after the founder enlisted friendly federal politicians, and then actively helped people attend. Their tipis became a lasting Stampede fixture.

The Stampede's 2025 midway menu put mopane worms, an edible caterpillar, on top of which dish?

Poutine got the mopane worms in 2025, and a year later dried mealworms topped the street corn. A fresh list of deliberately outrageous midway dishes is unveiled every spring, and the oddest make the headlines.

Many people expect 'Yee-haw', but which shout is the Stampede's own signature cheer?

Yahoo is the Stampede's own shout, the one politicians lead the audience through at the kickoff. Whether it should be yee-haw instead is a question Calgarians have fielded for years.