GIBSON BULLROPES & PRORODEO EQUIPMENT Since 1986 Post Office Box 240, Fountain, Florida 32438 Telephone  (850) 722-6789     Facsimile  (850) 722-8988 CONTACT US

www.GibsonProrodeo.com

WAY TOO MUCH ABOUT ME
Because a bunch of you insisted...

Latest Update: Wednesday, July 9, 2008...we added both a Blog and a Forum to the website back in December.  Come take a look, jump in and participate.  The blog is located at www.GibsonProrodeo.com/blog, and the Forum is located at www.GibsonProrodeo.com/forum.  Come check 'em out!

This is for the folks, mostly friends of mine, who have been after me to "write a little about yourself...put in a picture, etc."  Well, here it is, and it's quite likely that each and every one of you will eat those words, and soon be begging me to "please, take down that endless, ridiculous bio...and that PICTURE!"  Hey, you ask, and you shall receive.  I'm reminded of the old saying, "Be careful what you ask for."

Seriously, for those of you that are interested, here's my life, so far...

My name is Bruce Gibson.  I was born way back 46-years ago in Lompoc, California.  Since then, I've lived in Alexandria, Louisiana, Cheyenne, Wyoming, Pueblo, Colorado, Mountain Home, Idaho, Silver Bay, Minnesota, Spokane, Washington, McAllen, Texas, Bossier City, Louisiana, Panama City, Florida, Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and ultimately, Fountain, Florida.  Those are the places I've lived...I've visited, or passed through most of the others.

I was what many folks refer to as an "Air Force Brat."  It requires a lot of travel and relocating, so that's what I did.  Every few years a different school, in a different place.  New cultures, and new people.  I don't think it messed me up too bad because I didn't know any different.  I thought everybody moved every few years.  I'm as comfortable with grits and collards as I am with bratwurst or sushi.  For the record, I don't eat sushi.  I'm not that sophisticated. 

Living in Cheyenne, Wyoming, you can't help but be exposed to the "Daddy of 'Em All," better known as Cheyenne Frontier Days, so the rodeo bug bit early on, and I had to be a cowboy.  Not a ranch-working, cattle-chasing, calf-branding cowboy, but a bullriding rodeo "cowboy."  There's a huge difference, and my respect has always gone to the working cowboy.  A working cowboy uses his gear every day.  Mine stayed packed up in a gearbag most days...except for the weekend rodeos and chances to take life in hand and show off...or look foolish.  "Cowboy," in that respect, is strictly a courtesy title.  The true cowboys, in my opinion, are the folks that bust their butts in the dirt every day, day in, and day out.  To be a competing professional was fun, and flashy, with an occasional dose of glory, but in the true Americana sense, not real cowboy.  You seldom see the real cowboys in a rodeo arena, and that's more true today than ever before.

During this same period I became interested in radio.  The "hip" morning DJ at the time was a guy named Roger Johnson.  He was the morning talent on Duluth, Minnesota's WAKX-FM.  He went by the moniker, "R.J. the Morning Mouth," and we all listened to him.  He'd also do a school dance here and there, and that's the venue he was working when I met him.  I was also a cowboy and rhythmically challenged enough that dancing wasn't something I'd ever be accused of.  I can't dance. 

Waiting for the school bus in Finland AFS, Minnesota, with the temperature hovering in the 20-some-odd-below-zero range, we all listened to RJ on WAKX.  And froze our butts off.  I thought radio would be a really cool way to make a living without fighting the elements, or working too hard, and I was half-right.  Radio is a really cool way to struggle, scratch and claw out a bare living without fighting the elements.  And, the coffee's always on. 

My "radio career" started as a result of hanging around WDSM/KZIO in Duluth, Minnesota.  The studios were on Superior Street, and you could look out the big glass windows at Lake Superior while you were doing your thing on the second-floor.  My "thing" at the time was mainly emptying trash cans, and practicing in the production room.  Creating recordings of "make believe" radio shows.  Air-checks, as they're known in the business.  On my best days, I was terrible.  We won't talk about the others.  A wise old program director told me once that all he cared about was the tape--if it was good, he'd look at the resume.  If the tape was bad, the resume went in the trash, and the tape got recycled in the production room. 

All of this was traditional "break-in" for an aspiring announcer in the late 70's.  Nowadays, real-live announcers have been largely replaced by satellite, hard-drives and automation.  In those days, you had to be there.  Today, you can record your part of a six-hour shift in fifteen minutes and let the computer do the rest.  I ultimately worked at WUSW (US96) in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, WJST (T-94) Panama City/Port St. Joe, Florida, WPFM, Panama City Beach, Florida, WFSY (Sunny 98.5), Panama City, Florida, WRBA, Panama City, WAKT (Kat Country 105), Panama City, Florida, WPAP, Panama City, Florida, WKGC AM/FM, Panama City, Florida, and did a lot of voice work (commercials) for Comcast, and others, in Panama City, Florida.  Overall, it was fun.  As with most things, it was much more fun in hindsight than in reality.  You could, and did, get fired at the drop of a hat.  It sure beat working for a living.

One of the other jobs I got into during this time was with the Panama City, Florida, Fire Department.  It was stable, predictable, and boring.  Maybe I should rephrase that and say, "hours and hours of boredom interspersed with moments of sheer terror."  I worked with them some eight years.  The primary draw was that I didn't do much of anything...it's in the job description.  You show up, you hang around for twelve hours, but you don't have to do much.  My gig was "communications," so I wasn't required to get my hands dirty, or take any risks short of falling down the stairs.  If the phone rang, you answered it.  During this time, I spent my shifts making bullropes for bullriders around the United States, Canada and Australia   I also studied, and became a paralegal.  That's what my diploma says, anyway.  Paralegal.  Fully qualified to assist lawyers in various areas of this convoluted thing we call the law.  I did not know then, nor am I sure now, exactly what a paralegal is.  Despite that, I've been one since 1992, specializing in criminal defense. 

Criminal defense, to me, is a fascinating area of the law.  In a nutshell, criminal defense boils down to not necessarily getting guilty people off the hook, as many people believe, but more in keeping law enforcement officers and prosecutor's honest.  In fairness, the great majority of police officers and prosecutor's are decent, hard-working people.  It's the exceptions that make it interesting. 

The field of criminal defense primarily consists of escorting people charged with crimes through our complex system of criminal justice, and also pin-pointing law enforcement officers that play fast & loose with the truth.  In my years of assisting criminal defense lawyers, I assisted in defending more than a handful of police officers charged with crimes.  Oh, and lest I forget, one judge.  Yep, judges occasionally find themselves standing in front of the bench instead of sitting behind it.

Finally, we come to what I do now, and what I've done consistently throughout the past twenty-plus years while doing all the other stuff.  My specialty is bullriding, and bull riding equipment, along with custom gun belts, and holsters.  I've been a custom bullrope maker since 1986.  Unbelievably, it's been twenty-two years.  In fact, I've been making ropes longer than that, but it takes a few years before you're capable of making a rope that someone would be willing to use.  It was 1986 when I started sending my ropes out into the world.

Since then, we've "diversified" into custom saddle making, rodeo and cowboy chaps, chinks, sponsor chaps, rodeo equipment for all the roughstock events, saddle making books, DVD's and patterns, and also DVD's on chap making, and holsters, gun belts and knife sheaths.  We also custom make Australian bull whips, and stock whips from both cowhide and kangaroo.  There's a lot more, but I don't want to overwhelm you...or, me.  Especially, me!  We're not currently taking chap, whip, or saddle orders, and we're getting away from the bareback and saddle bronc events.

I still do some work on the occasional criminal case if something interesting, or newsworthy crawls along.  Here in my part of the Northwest Florida Panhandle, fondly known as "The Redneck Riviera," we see much more than our share of interesting, and many times horrifying, criminal cases.

That, my friends, is my life in a nutshell.  Thank you, to all of you that requested a bio. 

Be well, and best regards,

Bruce Gibson
E-mail:  Click Here
www.GibsonProrodeo.com