Florence LaDue
Florence "Flores" LaDue | |
|---|---|
 LaDue in Calgary circa 1913 | |
| Born | Grace Maud Bensel June 27, 1883 Montevideo, Minnesota, U.S. |
| Died | August 9, 1951 (aged 68) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Cowgirl |
| Spouse | |
Florence "Flores" LaDue (June 27, 1883 - August 9, 1951) was a vaudeville performer and champion trick roper.[1] Together with her husband, Canadian cowboy Guy Weadick, she organized and produced the first Calgary Stampede. LaDue is credited as the inventor of the rope trick known as the "Texas Skip."[2][3]
Biography
[edit]Born Grace Maud Bensel in Montevideo, Minnesota, her mother died while she was an infant and her father, C.D. Bensel, was a criminal lawyer and later a judge. She spent most of her young life on a Sioux reservation where her grandfather was the government agent.[4][5]
Bensel left home, by some accounts running away to join a wild west show.[5] By 1905 she was performing with the Cummins's Wild West Show and Indian Congress under the name Florence LaDue. and began performing under the name Florence LaDue.[4] At a show in Chicago in 1905, she met Guy Weadick, an accomplished rider and roper from Canada. The two married on November 17, 1906.[1][4]
Florence LaDue and Guy Weadick led a peripatetic life for the next five years. They worked with John P. Kirk’s Elite Vaudeville co. in 1908 and were appearing with Will Rogers’ Wild West show in 1910.[6] They had a stint on Broadway in ‘Wyoming Days’[4] and did the Keith-Albee, Orpheum, and Pantages vaudeville circuits, as well as appearances in Glasgow, London, and Paris.[1] LaDue performed solo, with her husband as "Weadick and LaDue," and in larger groups.
In 1911, LaDue appeared in the Miller Brothers 101 Show, where she squared off against their star performer, "America's First Cowgirl," Lucille Muhall.[4] By 1912, she and her husband had settled in Calgary, Alberta, where LaDue helped her husband found the Calgary Stampede.[7] In September of the same year, LaDue defeated Muhall in competition, becoming the women's champion in fancy and trickroping, a title she maintained until her retirement in 1927.[1][5][7]
Towards the end of her life, in the hopes of improving LaDue's failing health, the couple sold their home outside Calgary and moved to Phoenix, Arizona. LaDue died of heart failure in 1951.[6]
Legacy
[edit]In 2001 she was inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame.[7][2]
LaDue is profiled in a children's book called Howdy, I'm Flores LaDue by Ayesha Clough, with illustrations by Hugh Rookwood and Keegan Starlight, published in 2022 by Red Barn Books. ISBN 978-1-989915-04-2
With the Completion of the BMO Centre expansion on June 5, 2024. The Calgary Stampede announced plans to name the 17th Avenue extension into the park as "Flores LaDue Parade". This was done in recognition of her efforts during the early days of the Calgary Stampede alongside her husband Guy Weadick.
References
[edit]
- 1 2 3 4 Enss, Chris. "Wild Women Of The West: Florence LaDue". COWGIRL Magazine. Retrieved August 4, 2026.
- 1 2 "Flores LaDue - Cowgirl Hall of Fame & Museum". Cowgirl Hall of Fame & Museum. Retrieved May 14, 2017.
- ↑ BudEdgar (September 2, 2014). The Texas Skip. Retrieved August 9, 2026 – via YouTube.
- 1 2 3 4 5 LeCompte, Mary Lou (1993). Cowgirls of the rodeo: pioneer professional athletes. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. p. 51. ISBN 0252020294. OCLC 27035147.
- 1 2 3 Taylor, Peter Shawn (November 1, 2011). "REVIEW: The first stampede of Flores Ladue: The true love story of Florence and Guy Weadick and the beginning of the Calgary stampede". MacLean's. Rogers Media. Retrieved November 24, 2016.
- 1 2 Rogers, Will; Wertheim, Arthur Frank (2001). From Vaudeville to Broadway: September 1908 - August 1915. Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma Press. pp. 312, 428. ISBN 0806133155. OCLC 174788836.
- 1 2 3 Canton, Maria (December 8, 2001). "Hall of fame ropes in famous cowgirl pioneer". Calgary Herald. Calgary, AB: CanWest Interactive. p. B1. – via LexisNexis (subscription required)