Arena Tracks by Penny Schlagel: Manke

In early June, I was eating a burger at Jake’s Lounge in Letcher, S.D., when my phone rang.  It was a mild miracle as Jake’s is in a tin shed and Letcher has zero reception in general, but there on the line, clear as day was Franklin Manke. The SDHSRA was planning to honor the former NHSRA Champions as part of the 75th Anniversary Celebration. Franklin, the 1952 NHSRA Bareback and All Around Champion, was needing some information. I was more than a little star-struck.

Franklin entered the 1952 NHSRF in Augusta, Mont., as the SDHSRA Champion All Around Cowboy, Bareback Rider, Calf Roper and Boys Cutter. Franklin hailed from Newcastle, Wyo., at the time but rodeoed in South Dakota as Wyoming didn’t yet have a high school rodeo program.  Franklin’s folks, along with numerous grandparents, siblings and aunts and uncles loaded up and headed west to Montana, looking at it as a vacation, much as families do today. Franklin gave his family and the rest of the crowd a show, coming away with a National Championships in Barebacks and the All Around title, while placing third in the Calf Roping. Franklin’s efforts were rewarded with a buckle and saddle as the NHSRA All Around Champion. There were no prizes for the individual events, just the honor of the title.

After graduating from high school, Franklin went to ranching on the home place near Mule Creek Junction, Wyo.  He made the choice to ranch and rodeo more locally rather than hit the highway and travel to the bigger RCA (it wasn’t the PRCA until the mid-1970s) rodeos across the country.  Franklin found success in the NRCA, specifically winning the 1956 Barebacks and All Around championships and the Steer Wrestling titles in 1957 and 1958. Franklin also team roped, winning over 25 buckles and 5 saddles in a time when the saddles and buckles weren’t so prevalent.

Franklin’s individual accolades are noteworthy and admirable, but his greatest accomplishment is the legacy his family left on high school rodeo.  Franklin, his son Jay and grandson Tyler are all South Dakota State High School Rodeo Champions. Additionally, Franklin’s daughter, Janie Manke-Tinant, was a Wyoming State All Around Champion. I know of only one other family (the Webbs/Haugens) that have 3 generations of SD State High School Rodeo Champions in their lineage.

Franklin’s son, Jay, grew up with a rope in his hand as he liked to be on top of a horse and saw no sense in getting bucked off of one.  Jay said he had a choice to either be cleaning the barn or roping the dummy and he decided the latter was his better option.  While the Mankes’ had moved into Edgemont to run the family hotels, they still kept the ranch and always ran 40 head of longhorns so they had roping stock. Franklin and all the neighbors would rope a couple nights a week at their place with the kids out back roping the dummy for a penny a head. All that practice served Jay well, as he went on to win the SDHSRA Team Roping Championship with partner, Jay Henry. The NHSR was in Sulfur, LA that year and SW South Dakota was in a bit of a hay crunch.  The team decided the 22 hour, 6 state trip (one way) was too much so they’d wait until the next year.  As fate would have it, the next year at the Regional Rodeo, Jay won the first go of the Calf Roping and the team secured the round one win in the Team Roping.  Overnight, he fell ill and could barely ride a horse, let alone rope.  He didn’t qualify for the SD State High School Rodeo that last year, ending the season on a low note.

Jay went on to work for the railroad, needing to be ready on an hour and a half notice to take the next shift as the trains came through town. When his son, Ty Manke, decided he wanted to be a cowboy, Jay wasn’t always sure what his schedule would look like from week to week. Franklin gladly stepped in and took to traveling with his grandson when Jay couldn’t.

Ty Manke got pulled into the rough stock world when a friend of his entered a mini bull riding, asking him to enter as well. Ty was hooked and has continued to compete long after his buddy quit. That might have been his start, but Ty says that 99 percent of the reason he wanted to be a cowboy was because of grandpa Franklin. He inspired Ty to be a bronc rider and helped to buy him his first saddle bronc saddle. The pair hauled all over the country, starting as a Little Wrangler in the Little Britches on up to the National High School Finals where Ty was crowned the 2005 Reserve Champion Saddle Bronc rider after earning the 2005 SDHSRA Saddle Bronc and All Around Championships.

As a younger man, Ty covered the United States hitting the bigger rodeos like Houston and Pendleton living the life Franklin had eschewed in exchange for a life ranching. Since marrying and having children, Ty has chosen to stay closer to home and the circuit rodeos qualifying for the Badlands Circuit Finals for 16 years. He would have made it 17 this year had he not been injured in July. When I asked him if he planned to return to riding broncs, he said “Oh yeah.  I’ve always admired Chad Ferley, Jessie Bail and JJ Elshere and figure if they can ride until they are 40, then so can I.”  As a backup, Ty started team roping.  At a Wrangler Roping last year he said his heart was pounding way faster than any time he stood behind the chutes, even in the bigger venues. When asked about Franklin, Ty said he owes him so much.  Franklin took him rodeoing and hunting and made his way of life possible.

The Manke family is already preparing the fourth generation of cowboys and cowgirls.  Ty and wife Trista’s children, Kwade, 6 and Mackley, 3 are both interested in horses and rodeo.  The family has been traveling with Kwade to local playday series and he has entered the Mutton Bustin at the rodeos that Ty enters. I think we can be assured that the 3 generations before him will all be behind the chutes cheering Kwade on no matter what end of the arena he chooses to master.