Billy Cook saddle History

[3arrows]

Hi guys, hope you are all having a great Memorial Day Holiday. I need some help on the history of the Billy Cook Saddles. Does anybody know the story around Billy Cook going out of business and selling the design to Simco/Longhorn? I have a Greenville Tx Billy Cook saddle and think it is a great saddle, only to be told by another person that this is actually a Simco saddle not a BC saddle afterall?? Any help on the history of these saddles and the history of Billy Cook? thanks ron

[superchute]

not shere on the Cook but there was a potts longhorn for a long not shere how that comes in but. Im shere it is in the mix some where.

Russell

[grumpyguy]

3arrows,

I have little information but for what it's worth here it goes, maybe someone out here has better. Billy Cook saddles were made on par with other production saddles like Hereford, Circle Y and others. I was seeing thier cutting models in the cutting arenas in the early and mideighties. They also produced a barrel saddle, a roping saddle along with what they called reigning and penning models. (Cut away skirts to get better leg ques on the horses sides.) I had the opportunity to purchase several cutters off and on and would have during that time. Thier cutter was very similar to the "semi custom" Bob Marshal cutters of the time period but considered inferior by alot of cutters. (They cost alot less too.) They both had pine with fiberglass covering. The production and semi custom saddles also had the fender as part of the stirup leather to make the stirups more free moving and eliminate another layer of thick leather, during this period. The late eighties began to see serious material and workmanship problems due to cost cutting in most all production saddles. Some saddles began useing a "half leather" riveted to the fenders. The rivets could pull out and the rider dumped among the feet of cattle and horses. (I saw one young lady who could not have wieghed more than 100#s dumped that way from a brand new "special ordered" production saddle made by a very well known maker.) Billy Cooks seemed to hold up thier quality and were in demand around the arenas for those unable to purchase the semi custom and customs. Around the end of the late eighties or early ninties the company was closed down. My understanding they were unable to compete in the market of that era. Later Billy Cooks began to be produced by Simco-Longhorn. They appear very much like the original production saddle designs and would be hard to tell apart. I have not seen any of the newer saddles up close though, so I really don't know anything about their quality. I much prefer the custom mades now and will rarely give serious thought to buying the production saddles, although I still own and use a couple of old Herefords occasionally. (One came with a horse I bought and the other was my daughters which she left with me when she went off to college.)

I did a lot of repair work on the Bob Marshals and Billy Cooks. The Marshal's were usually thicker, softer and better quality leather than the Billy Cook saddles and much easier to repair the old stitching or replacing the sheep skin. The stirup leathers wore well on both desins and I never did have to replace those on either models for anyone. (Some of these guys spent hours upon hours in the cutting arena.) Some of the riders had a more difficult time breakingk in the Billy Cooks due to the stiffer leather. But all in all the older saddles were quite serviceable and if taken care of performed well.

Not much as far as a historical account but that's what I know. Hope someone else has more to add, I would like to know how the new production stack up as they appear to be almost the same from photos I've seen. I imagine they are using some imported leathers and parts as the prices I've seen are not alot different than the current cheaper production saddles on todays market.

[billyjoe]

Billy Cook saddle are made in Mexico by T & T saddle

[bruce johnson]

Billy Cook has been around a while. There was an article in ShopTalk a while back on him. He has had control of the name a couple times. Recently he got some publicity for losing his work force in Sulphur to immigration issues. I had a couple Billy Cook cutters in the early 80s and they were pretty good. I had a Cheaney and a Cajun and really, none of them sat much different to me. There really is only so much you can do with the top side of a cutting board - fork height and horn styles are about it. There is not much trick to the seat other than keeping it off the withers. Grumpyguy pretty well summed up the time era and the reputations. I never got the chance to work on a Bob Marshall until recently. I was not particluarly impressed with it being superior to any of the Billys I have worked on.

There was a time when Billy had transferred rights to the name to a company. Rumor was that other saddles were being imported with the Billy Cook stamp too and sold through mail order, traveling tack auctions, traded in to saddle shops, etc. and nobody could ever verify what they had. There is some quality question as to the Greenville Billys vs. the Sulphur stamped ones too. Some is probably rumor and legend, and some is not. Billy Cook is not the only example. These quality issues and rumors always seem to pop up when a "name" saddlemaker sells the rights to use that name to someone else. It is still happening today.

Grumpy,

Regarding the production saddles riveted to the half leathers. Not a unique problem to the production guys. I have a relative who ended up on his head in a fairly new big name, high rep shop saddle. That apparently sent everyone else scurrying to lift their seat jockeys and see how their rivets looked at the top of the fenders before they went down the fence.

[grumpyguy]

3arrows,

I did a little checking and found that as mentioned Billy Cook produced saddles until he sold his original designs to Simco/Longhorn with legal right to lable them with the "Billy Cook" name. (Thus the reason the Simco/Longhorn looks like the old Billy Cook saddles.) He subsequently opened his saddle making business selling his newer updated Saddle Designs. His saddles are marked Billy Cook Maker, Sulpher, OK. So yours with the Texas mark may be a Simco?Longhorn and would be one of the original designs by Billy Cook. I noticed the Sulpher saddles are advertised as using Muir McDonald leather.

[3arrows]

Thanks guys for the info, really good history lesson here. I guess the best thing to do when buying these saddles is to look for the quality and not necessarily the name. The more I learn about this business the more interesting it gets. Thanks again ...........Ron

[SmokinP]

I've got a Billy Cook I bought new somewhere around 1980. It's a roping saddle...I think they called it a steer roping saddle. It's about as plain as you can get...only "tooling" is the maker stamp and the ID # on the latigo holder. It has seen it's rough days so it sure couldn't be called pretty. But it's the one I swing up most times. It just works real well for me. Only thing is it is heavy. I tell folks I'm never sure whether it's easier to put it on the horse or pick up the horse and put him in the saddle.

Last year bought the wife a BC Wade type saddle. Of course it's got all the pretty tooling and stuff. It is a nice looking rig. I tried it out just a little bit on a filly the other day and it seemed pretty comfortable and secure. Seems to be very well built and the details are nicely done. It'll probably never see any rough stuff so I'm pretty confident it'll work out good. Wife seems to like it really well.

But yes, Billy Cook is basically a name that has been for sale. So you can't just close your eyes and pick one off the shelf. Look at it good, ask questions. True for most things these days I suppose.

[jennifer]

From what I have researched I believe Billy Cook was a saddlemaker in Greenville, Texas prior to 1981 when he sold his designs & the rights to use his name to Longhorn with a 10 year non-competition agreement. In 1991 he opened shop in Sulphur Oklahoma.

He was apparently a good enough saddle maker to sell the rights to his name and designs.

If you have a saddle that was made in Greenville Texas that is stamped "Billy Cook Saddlery Greenville Texas" it is a Longhorn or Longhorn/Simco saddle. If it is stamped "Billy Cook Maker, Greenville Texas" it should be a pre-1981 saddle made by Billy Cook.

If it says Billy Cook Maker, Genuine, Sulpher Oklahoma it was made by the production shop currently owned by Billy Cook.

My research was not based on actual newspaper or legal documentation, so I wouldn't guarantee this to be fact. You could call both Longhorn and the Billy Cook Sulpher Oklahoma shops to get more information.

Jennifer

[PENSKE]

Thats its not true TT saddlery make a circle S saddle,circle t saddle,

And blue river saddle All of them poor quality saddle with cheaps tree

any question let me know

Billy Cook saddle are made in Mexico by T & T saddle

[TroyWest]

Billy Cook opened shop in Greenville, Tx. many yrs. ago after serving a time in the military where he had met Bill Potts. After a time they got together because Billy had the shop and Bill had the money. It became Billy Cook Saddlery/Potts Longhorn. The Billy Cook saddles were the upper line saddles, and Longhorn were the lower line. The Billy Cook saddles had better trees, Herman Oak leather, beveled stainless dees, hand tooling, and hand sewed rigs to skirts. Longhorn were lesser priced trees, regular stainless hardware, synthetic wool, and machine sewed rigs to skirts.

Tooling patterns were often pressed by a huge press, which is what made a lot of those saddles really hard and stiff. The people that worked there were proud of their work and proud to work there and made one of the best production saddles of that day. Jay Lynn Gore was the head tooler there for many years. The tooling look of Billy Cook saddles was largely the work of Jay Lynn.

Billy was the manager of this operation for many years, designing all the saddles, making patterns, and then having a complete set of dies made for every new design. Billy believes in dies.

Billy later started another shop in downtown Greenville making harness. It was called Billy Cook Harness. Eventually he started making saddles there too. He would work at Longhorn in the morning and go to the harness shop in the afternoon.

Billy Cook Saddlery/Potts Longhorn had coorporate offices in Dallas. In the late 80's Bill Potts passed away. The Co. continued to be run from Dallas. The co. had tons of orders but there was corporate embezzlement in Dallas and the co. went chapter 11, and then chapter 7. Everybody wanted to buy it and it went up for auction. Don Motsenbokker bought it. (I dont know if I spelled that right) Don was originally a bookkeeper for the Shoelkopf family. This was the family that used to make Jumbo Saddles. Don knew the saddle buisness and already owned Action, Tex Tan, Simco,which is in Chattanooga, Saddlesmith, and now Billy Cook Saddlery. He then advertised as the largest saddle co. in the world, which he probably was. That is how Simco and Longhorn came to be associated. Simco is still in Chattanooga, Longhorn is still in Greenville, Tx.

They did combine the coorporate offices in Chattanooga and call it Simco/Longhorn.

Billy Cook did not sell his name, he just couldn't keep it. When the Co went bankrupt everything went up with it, including the name, which had international recognition, Which is what made it valuable. He did keep building saddles at Billy Cook Harness until the I.R.S. shut him down for not paying his taxes, or not doing witholdings correctly for a number of years which amounted to a ton of money, which put him out of buisness in Greenville.

Sulphur, O.K., had one of those grant type situations to get new buisnesses in their town and Billy got one. That is why he has his buisness there while still having his home in Greenville, Tx.

No one who works at the Greenville plant is an original employee, but all the dies and patterns were done by Billy Cook. When those companies fuse like that they can buy literally truckloads, traincar loads of leather, synthetic fleece, glues, threads, etc. everything and distribute them to their various plants, also much cheaper than any small shop can do. This is one reason why a custom shop can't compete with a production shop, and shouldn't even try.

The bottom line is Ron, if you have a Billy Cook saddle then it was made in Greenville, Tx. Billy Cook saddles have never been made in Mexico, or in Tn. Saddles labeled genuine Billy Cook saddles are made in Sulphur, O.K. where Billy wants it to be clear that that is where he is, the real Billy Cook. If you have a Greenville, Tx. Billy Cook saddle and you like it, just enjoy it.

Troy West

[superchute]

Thanks Troy great job on geting the facts

Russell

[TroyWest]

Thanks Troy great job on geting the facts

Russell

You're welcome,

Troy

[CutterGa]

Troy, thanks so much for the info about the Billy cook saddles. I really like the Billy Cook saddle that I have and am going to keep it and restore it. I do have a question that no one has been able to answer yet. Do you know what " Made for Rolling" implies??? Is this a reining or cutting term?? It is stamped on the latigo keeper on my BC saddle..thanks again. ron..

[jennifer]

Thank you Troy for the clarification. I was still curious about identification so I called both Billy Cook Harness and Saddle in Sulpher Oklahoma and Longhorn/Simco makers of the Billy Cook Saddlery saddles and got the following information:

From Dick in Texas I was told that Longhorn uses only the Billy Cook Saddlery Stamp, if it says "Billy Cook Maker" it belongs to the Sulpher Oklahoma company. He didn't know if Billy Cook used that stamp before leaving Texas. He doesn't have any records of that stamp being used and they don't have rights to use the maker stamp. If you have a model number he can try to look it up. He doesn't have records prior to 81, but he does have some old catalogs and can sometimes find information on older Potts-Longhorn saddles.

From Christy in Oklahoma I was told that if it says "Billy Cook Maker" it was made by Billy Cook either in Texas or Oklahoma. She also told me that Billy brought with him a practice of indicating the year the saddle was made and still uses the same methodology. If you look under the Fender the first two digits before the model number tell you what year the saddle was made.

Neither company had any clue what "Made Special for Rolling" meant. Christy said it may possibly be a person's name, but "Billy won't remember".

Phone numbers are: 800-251-6294 (Texas) and 800-311-7549 (Oklahoma).

Jennifer

[TroyWest]

Troy, thanks so much for the info about the Billy cook saddles. I really like the Billy Cook saddle that I have and am going to keep it and restore it. I do have a question that no one has been able to answer yet. Do you know what " Made for Rolling" implies??? Is this a reining or cutting term?? It is stamped on the latigo keeper on my BC saddle..thanks again. ron..

Ron,

Your question intrigued me, I'd never heard that term, so I called Billy Cook, Sulphur and they didn't know and said they don't do that. I know the guy who runs the Greenville plant and he didn't know either . I said who would know? He said Dick Chambers, ceo Chattanooga might know. So I called him. He didn't know either. Suggested it might have been made for an individual named Rolling?

There is the term rollback, which is done on horseback but I never heard it referred to as rolling.

Well I just read Jennifers post before posting mine and she basically found out the same thing. Great minds think alike. Maybe your just supposed to set it on the back of the couch and roll off on the floor!...sorry

Have a great day

Troy

[3arrows]

Thanks everybody (Jennifer and Troy) for doing the history on this saddle. I think I know what the term refers to. If you look at the cost to compete in the Cutting Horse industry, you have to be "Rolling" in money to do it. Man the Cutting Horse sport costs more than my airplanes do...thanks again. ron..

Edited May 27, 2008 by 3arrows

[superchute]

for shere on the planes cheaper then the horses. I have Biplane and pa28 for shere the horse cost me more

Russell

[Rancher]

I went in a saddle shop in Midland, TX back in the mid 80's owned by a man named Bill Cook. Wonder if he's any relation?

[Tosch]

Does someone has an email address for Billy Cook, OK, ? I cannot find any, nor can I find a website. If possible the CEOs email, I wanted to let them know that on Germany's ebay fake (or I would be too severely mistaken) Billy Cooks are being offered - from India, and not for the first time.

For anyone interested here is a link: http://cgi.ebay.de/16-BILLY-COOK-WESTERN-S...A1%7C240%3A1318

and here another: http://cgi.ebay.de/16-BILLY-COOK-WESTERN-S...A1%7C240%3A1318

If you have an email address let me know (PM) or let Billy Cook know directly if you want.

Tosch

[MikePatterson]

GREAT JOB TROY SAVED ME A BUNCH OF ONE FINGER TYPING !!!!!!

YOU ARE RIGHT ON.

[hidepounder]

Reading this thread is interesting to me. In 1968 I had a summer job tooling saddles for Wallace Stevens Saddlery here is Phoenix. Wallace made stout, skirt rigged roping saddles which were very popular at the time and he made Billy Cook saddles as well. Billy Cook would ship six trees and six hides to the shop and Wallace would crank them out using his saddlemakers "in training". About the time those saddles were finished, another order of 6 trees & hides would be delivered. I tooled a lot of them and put the Billy Cook makers stamp on them...however I don't remember exactly what the stamp said...it's been too long. I remember the saddlemakers having races to see who could cover their horn the fastest...they would pre-fab them, soak them, then pull them on and finish stitching them in place.The slowest guy bought the beer on Friday. After seeing how those saddles were constructed, I vowed never to rope in a Billy Cook saddle! We were always being pushed to get them finished so we could get a larger share of the subcontracts. So, in the late sixties, not all Billy Cook saddles were made in his shop or under his supervision. FYI.

Bob

Edited February 9, 2009 by hidepounder

[kfiretwo]

Reading this thread is interesting to me. In 1968 I had a summer job tooling saddles for Wallace Stevens Saddlery here is Phoenix. Wallace made stout, skirt rigged roping saddles which were very popular at the time and he made Billy Cook saddles as well. Billy Cook would ship six trees and six hides to the shop and Wallace would crank them out using his saddlemakers "in training". About the time those saddles were finished, another order of 6 trees & hides would be delivered. I tooled a lot of them and put the Billy Cook makers stamp on them...however I don't remember exactly what the stamp said...it's been too long. I remember the saddlemakers having races to see who could cover their horn the fastest...they would pre-fab them, soak them, then pull them on and finish stitching them in place.The slowest guy bought the beer on Friday. After seeing how those saddles were constructed, I vowed never to rope in a Billy Cook saddle! We were always being pushed to get them finished so we could get a larger share of the subcontracts. So, in the late sixties, not all Billy Cook saddles were made in his shop or under his supervision. FYI.

Bob

bob

If im not mistaken american saddlery of rossville ga is making a lesser quaility saddle with billly cooks name on them, I have rode in one it was like riding a fence post that wasnt debarked

lol it had more high low places in the seat, i have also found many fence post with the billy cook tag on the cantle that was imported also billy cook is no longer an american name saddle buyer be ware ride before u buy this saddle

[hidepounder]

bob

If im not mistaken american saddlery of rossville ga is making a lesser quaility saddle with billly cooks name on them, I have rode in one it was like riding a fence post that wasnt debarked

lol it had more high low places in the seat, i have also found many fence post with the billy cook tag on the cantle that was imported also billy cook is no longer an american name saddle buyer be ware ride before u buy this saddle

That may be true, I have no knowledge about them. My only experience with Billy Cook saddles was from the late sixties.

[HarryB]

Is he out of jail, yet?!