Altenburg Ready to Rodeo

Plans are being finalized for the tenth annual Perry County Community Rodeo, which will be held Friday, June 4 and Saturday, June 5 at the East Perry Community Fairgrounds in Altenburg. The Corporate sponsors for the rodeo are Altenburg Hardwood Lumber Company and Buchheit, Your Country Superstore. In addition to the seven official events, the calf scramble and mutton busting (sheep riding) events for kids will return prior to the regular rodeo events. The children with the top ten scores each evening in mutton busting will compete in a final round during the intermission of the official rodeo performance. Ticket prices for the event have been reduced to $5.00 at the gate in observance of the tenth anniversary of the event. Children age 10 and under admitted at no charge.

The rodeo is sanctioned by the International Professional Rodeo Association (IPRA), which is based in Oklahoma City and holds it's annual International Finals Rodeo (IFR) there each January. The IPRA is the second largest rodeo sanctioning body in the world. Being one of the highest paying rodeos on the IPRA circuit, the Altenburg event draws many of the top money winners in the association as well as several local competitors. The contestants at the Altenburg rodeo over its first nine years have included many current and former IPRA champions. Other Altenburg entries over the years have included past competitors from the PRCA National Finals Amanda Clayman, Ronnie Fields, and Doug Fennell; current Professional Bull Riders (PBR) tour members Austin Meier and Skeeter Kingsolver; Cord McCoy, of television's "The Amazing Race"; and World's Toughest Cowboy competitors Bandy Murphy and Erik Wolford.

Providing the humor for this year's rodeo will be Brian White from Oklahoma City, who has been involved in rodeo since he was a child. While he was earning his degree in Recreation Management he was part of three football conference championship teams and earned All-America honors in track. He has 15 years experience as a bullfighter and ten as a rodeo clown. Announcer Brandon McLagan, who worked over 100 rodeo and bull riding performances in over twenty states during 2009, and acclaimed soundman Mark Evans will join him on this year's rodeo entertainment team.

Universal Rodeos LLC of rural Jackson will again serve as the stock contractors for the event. Headed by Mark Johnson, they own a string of outstanding stock including bulls and broncs that have competed at the IPRA International Finals Rodeo, the PRCA National Finals, Cheyenne Frontier Days, and in several Professional Bull Riders (PBR) events.

This year's rodeo will benefit the "Shop With A Cop" program by giving it $1.00 per paid admission to this year's event. In the past the organizations that were involved in the promotion of the rodeo used proceeds from the rodeo to fund their community service and betterment projects without specifying specific projects or amounts for which the proceeds were being used.

Musical entertainment following the rodeo performances will be provided by "The Jimmy Lee Band" on Friday night and by "Uncle Pearl" on Saturday night. Miss Rodeo USA 2010, Dakota Missildine of Grady, Alabama, will participate in the rodeo and lead its Grand Entry. Rodeo performances are scheduled to begin at 7:30 pm each evening with pre-rodeo activities starting at 6:30pm and gates opening at 5:00 pm. The rodeo is a joint effort of the East Perry Community Fair and the EPC Country Club, which is the successor community service organization to the EPC Jaycees. Additional information is available at SEMO Events on the Southeast Missourian website or at www.perrycountymo.us.