Meet the 2018 PBR Rookie of the Year, the Dallas Cowboys’ brand leader, and an Olympic medal-winning archer from Arizona.
Every year, C&I produces a comprehensive list of the best of the West: the adventures, the lifestyles, the heritage. This year, we focused on people and have rounded up the innovators, influencers, and fascinating figures who make up the many faces of the modern West. Here, the masters of sport that have leapt up our leaderboard.
Keyshawn Whitehorse
Hangin’ on and ridin’ rank
2018 PBR Rookie of the Year | Dallas
Keyshawn Whitehorse (pictured above) was born into the Navajo Nation, surrounded by tight-knit familial bonds and the rugged beauty of Utah reservation land. By the age of 5 he’d fallen in love with bull riding after seeing it on TV. His family didn’t have a rodeo background, but Whitehorse’s parents supported their son’s passion. From makeshift practices on a metal barrel built by his father to reservation rodeos, Whitehorse began to harness his talents. Eventually, the family relocated to Texas, but the young cowboy held fast to his roots.
“One thing that has stuck out to me is that, no matter how far I go in the sport, never forgetting where I come from, that’s what gives me the strength to keep going and keep pushing,” says Whitehorse, who turns 22 in June.
Whitehorse was part of the team when PBR featured a solely Native American squad in its Global Cup competition this February, competing as he always does, wearing traditional beading done by his grandmother.
And by all accounts, Whitehorse is on track to go far. Last year he won the 2018 Rookie of the Year title at the Professional Bull Riders World Finals. The win came down to the last ride between Whitehorse and another rookie. He credits his faith and family, as well as his heritage, for helping him stay levelheaded under pressure.
Whitehorse was part of the team when PBR featured a solely Native American squad in its Global Cup competition this February, competing as he always does, wearing traditional beading done by his grandmother.
He hopes Native American youth will be inspired by his accomplishments and pride in his heritage. “I don’t want them to just see me as a person who rides bulls,” he says. “I want them to see me more as a person that’s been where they’ve been and was able to make something of themselves and not forget who they are, and about their family and their morals.”
— Lindsay Whelchel
Charlotte Jones Anderson
Putting the marketing star on America’s Team
Executive vice president and chief brand officer, Dallas Cowboys | Dallas
The hot-pants situation had blown up in 1989. A rumor was circulating that the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders’ famous super-short shorts were being replaced with — gasp! — bike shorts, and the cheerleaders were outraged. Jerry Jones, who had bought the struggling Dallas Cowboys football team recently, called his daughter, Charlotte Jones Anderson, for help. Then just 23 and working in politics in Washington, D.C., the recent Stanford grad agreed to help her father out.
She’s in charge of everything related to the marketing of the Dallas Cowboys brand, from approving all official team apparel to coordinating all community-related events to overseeing the team’s philanthropic efforts.
The hot pants stayed, and so did Anderson. Now, nearly three decades later, her official title is executive vice president and chief brand officer, which means she’s in charge of everything related to the marketing of the Dallas Cowboys brand, from approving all official team apparel to coordinating all community-related events to overseeing the team’s philanthropic efforts. She’s worked to market to women in particular; they make up nearly half of the Cowboys fan base. At Anderson’s direction, there’s now a football-centric website designed by women, for women, called 5 Points Blue, which features a lifestyle component with easy, healthy game-time recipes, at-a-glance stories on the players and coaches, and plenty of Dallas Cowboys-centric fashion.
For Anderson, it’s all about America’s Team and that iconic star. She lives it and breathes it and wants you to feel — and wear — the love, too.
— Ellise Pierce
Brady Ellison
Shooting straight
Olympic archer | Globe, Arizona
World champion archer Brady Ellison has been on our watch list since the 2016 Summer Olympics. His passing resemblance to Leonardo DiCaprio may have drawn attention, but it was his recurve-bow skills and belt buckle that got ours.
A four-time winner of the Hyundai Archery World Cup, Ellison nabbed an individual bronze and a team silver at the 2016 Rio Games and a team silver in 2012 in London.
Born in Miami, Arizona, Ellison spends what little free time he has hunting, fishing, and attending rodeos and NFR’s Cowboy Christmas. If his hobbies aren’t proof enough, the 30-year-old wears his cowboy-country pride on the outside: He can always be seen in competitions hiding his shaggy blond locks under a fishhook-embellished baseball cap or, in some interviews, a cowboy hat.
But his most indispensable archery accessory is his enormous signature belt buckle that reads “Remembering Lane Frost.” The archer claims the late world champion bull rider, who died at 25 during a 1989 competition in Cheyenne, Wyoming, as his idol. The buckle is his lucky charm, and he never competes without it.
We’ll be looking for it as Ellison trains for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
— Kristin Brown
Photography: Andy Watson/Courtesy Bull Stock Media, Tayler Larsen/Courtesy Brady Ellison
From the May/June 2019 issue.
