T. B. “T. Berry” Porter

Sport: Rodeo

Induction Year: 2019

Inducted in 2015 in the Rodeo Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City, Porter was Louisiana’s first professional rodeo cowboy.

The Leesville native began rodeoing in the early 1940s and at the age of 16 became a member of the first professional cowboy association in the country, the Cowboy Turtle Association, that developed into the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (he holds PRCA membership card no. 325). His events were tie-down calf roping and steer wrestling.

At 22, Porter won the 1949 World Champion Calf Roper title at Madison Square Garden, presented his trophy saddle by Gene Autry after becoming the first world championship “rookie” to win the title. He quickly added the calf roping title at the 1949 World Rodeo in Boston in front of 6,000. He won numerous titles at major rodeos around North America, including the famed Cheyenne Frontier Days and the Calgary Stampede and in Fort Worth, Denver and Houston, along with Shreveport, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Fort Smith, Arkansas, and Salinas, California. In 1959, Porter became the first Louisiana cowboy to participate in the inaugural National Finals Rodeo. He was a member of the Wrangler Rodeo Team in the early 1950s, and was spotlighted in a promotional handout placed in every pair of jeans put on sale. His career earnings were over $100,000 in 22 years.

Shreveport Journal sports editor Jimmy Bullock called him “the Pelican State’s Mr. Rodeo” and said he was “famed as one of the nation’s foremost calf ropers” in a May 1, 1963 column. In 1978, the PRCA presented him with his gold membership card and a plaque in appreciation of his promotion of the sport of rodeo at the high school, collegiate and pro levels.