LAS ANIMAS, Colo.—Did aches and pains sharpen this saddle maker’s hearing?
Rick Myers was working on a Wyoming ranch when, in 1987, he decided it was time for a change. Had the former rodeo cowboy finally heard his true calling?
Myers says the real reason he sought a new livelihood was because he was spending more time at the chiropractor’s office than on the tractor. So he and his wife Debbie packed up their kids and moved to Amarillo, Texas, where he studied saddle making for a year at Texas State Technical Institute.
“We did repairs, we learned all about saddles,” says Myers, 61. “I did repairs when I was working on the ranch, but I didn’t realize how much went into saddle making. There’s an awful lot to learn.”
The family then moved to Las Animas, where Myers was raised, and he opened a shop in town. He spent a decade making saddles and repairing leather goods, and developed a following among area ranchers. He works at home now, about 5 miles south of Las Animas, where there’s a 360-degree view of snow-covered prairie and winter-blue sky.
“It’s worked out great to be at home,” he says. “When I’m here (not in town), ranchers can come by when they’re done with their day and they need something.”
Myers’ shop is one of those fascinating places inhabited by an artist: new tools and old-fashioned equipment like an awl-and-needle machine, stacks of patterns, racks of stamps and mallets for carving leather, a pile of fuzzy orange sheep’s wool, saddles with the patina of use and one under construction, braided leather quirts and leather book covers and old cowboy photos on the walls. And hanging in the air: the sharp, clean scent of leather.
Myers says he spends all day in the shop, making repairs and building a saddle that’s a kind of rehabilitation project.
“I got hurt in 2009. I had my shoulder broken when a tree fell on me. I’ve been limited in what I can do. I’m trying to get back in shape to do the things I need to do. When I get my shoulder back in shape, I’ll go back to making saddles.”
A Myers saddle was displayed in October at the Business and Arts Incubator in Rocky Ford along with an exhibit on Colorado agriculture. Others have shown up at farm sales and fetched good prices, says Las Animas resident Heath Spady who’s bought two of them.
“One of them, six or eight people were there to buy that saddle. It cost me $300 more than what it was when it was new, but it was a couple years old. Now, to go and buy one would be $1,000 more.
“We wanted one,” Spady says. “My dad especially wanted one. We just had never been able to afford it. There were lots of cowboy hats in that crowd.”
Myers has repaired old saddles for Spady, made chaps and other leather goods for him, and Spady calls him an artist.
“He’s not like a repairman. He’ll fix old stuff, but he’d rather build it from scratch. He’s built saddles all over.”
Myers’ saddles are more than just good-looking, Spady says.
“Rick is a real analyst. He sits in them. He’s ridden in the past. He’s a real student of the deal. I don’t think it’s possible for them not to ride as good as they look—he puts that much thought into them.”
Myers says it takes about 100 hours to make a saddle with extras like carving and rawhide trim, and the materials alone cost $1,800 to $2,000.
“The base price for a ‘plain Jane’ saddle with nothing on it is $2,800 to $3,100. And then you go from there, depending on what you want. Stamping and carving can add $600. There’s a certain price for bucking rolls or for silver conchos. You can get up to $3,500 pretty quickly.”
More people are riding horses than in the past—”When my dad and granddad were young, people farmed with horses,” Myers says—but the price of custom-made saddles puts them out of reach for many.
I get more repairs than saddles now,” he says. “There’s still a big demand for repairs. There aren’t a lot of people who make saddles.”
Myers estimates he’s made more than 200 saddles over the years, not counting 300 exercise saddles he made for a Lamar firm that sent most of them to Florida.
He’s watched saddle styles change—”It’s kind of like how fashions in women’s clothing change. At one time, everybody wanted a buckaroo saddle, then it was something else”—and he’s had some unusual leather-working requests.
“I’ve had some weird stuff come in,” Myers says. “One guy had a bear. He asked me, can you make a muzzle for it. It was a cub; he brought it in, sat it on the table and I made a muzzle for it. Another guy wanted a harness and a leash for a ferret. I made it and he walked the ferret out on the leash.”
Early in his career, he received a blue ribbon at the Colorado State Fair for a plain western saddle. The next year, his 15-year-old son, Layne, earned a blue ribbon for a saddle he’d made.
“I couldn’t touch it, but I talked him through it,” Myers says. “He competed against older guys and won, and now his blue ribbon is hanging next to mine.”
Myers didn’t enter other saddle making competitions because he thinks artistry is an individual thing, and he’s not sure it’s fair to judge an artist.
“I like to put a little of myself into the saddles,” he says. “There are so many types and styles, you can be creative. It’s just like a painter or a carpenter—you get to show your artistic talents, you get to have your own style. When a repair comes into the shop, I can tell who made the saddle by the style of it.”
The result of all the hard work, knowledge and artistry is “something you can be proud of and that will be there for generations to come.”
“You can hand a saddle down to your grandkids,” Myers says.
