75th Moses Lake Roundup Bob Ottmar will be there in spirit

MOSES LAKE — It’s hard to call Moses Lake a rodeo town, because it’s probably not. But its rodeo is rich in tradition and western heritage.

On a high note, Moses Lake Roundup will celebrate its 75th year as one of the best in the Pacific Northwest. And, on a sad note, like the wail of an ol’ hound dog in the night, this will be the first one that Bob Ottmar does not see.

The Columbia Basin rodeo world and Moses Lake community lost one of its greatest storytellers with the passing of Bob Ottmar back in April. Some might say that Bob was born a century too late.

As the story goes, Native American women that used to tie their infant’s cradleboard to the back of an old and trusted mare, that the rocking motion of the hobbled horse, slowly moving as it grazed, was nature’s rocking chair. I’d like to think that’s how Bob Ottmar came into this world, and that his gentle soul left on horseback, riding off into the sunset.

Bob spent 27,314 days on this earth and I was blessed to have spent one of those with him, listening to the stories, walking in his footsteps and trying to imagine a day in the life of a man that has seen every single Moses Lake Roundup through the first 74 years.

This year marks the 75th Moses Lake Roundup and Bob will be there in spirit. As I sat there in the kitchen of his small, but cozy house listening to the stories, his eyes gave way to his relief in passing them along one more time.

“I was born in June, so I was just three months old when my dad took me to my first rodeo. Don’t remember much of that one,” he said with a smile and twinkle in his eye.

Bob was born June 25, 1943, the eldest of George and Irene Ottmar’s five children. He went to his first rodeo back when founders Harold Schwab, Royal Rueter, Sud Saunders, Forbes Grigg and Guy Giersdorf, said, “We can put on a better rodeo than the one we were just at.”

Granted, he was just three months old, but the sights, the sounds and even the smells, left him with a lasting impression. His dad George helped at the timed event end, loading the calves and steers, so Bob was privy to the behind-the-scenes action all along, got to see the cowboys close up.

He was just 15 months old by the time his second Roundup rolled around, still learning where to step and not to put his hands in that stuff near the pens.

“My dad just sort of took me along. He went to every one from 1943 to 1959 and I just kept the family tradition going.”

He’s seen it all, from the time when the Moses Lake Roundup was ranch-hand vs. ranch-hand competition, back when they used to roundup the horses off the open prairie and use them as bucking horses in the show.

Along the way, Ottmar tried his hand at bareback and saddle bronc riding. In fact, six-time All-Around World Champion Larry Mahan put him on his first bareback horse.

“Larry was a pretty good friend,” he said, as if knowing one of the greatest cowboys in rodeo history was nothin’. “You get to where you see them all over the region, at Ellensburg or Pendleton or wherever.”

Then he brought out the box. The box of memories where life was captured one frame at time. In a time where that slice of life captured not only the spirit of the west, but the essence of the man.

In this day and age where iCloud storage can store literally thousands of images, there was a time when a cardboard box held the most cherished of black and white photographs. You see, Bob also traveled the rodeo trail as a professional rodeo photographer, back when it was called the Rodeo Cowboy Association.

You could almost smell the Dektol (developer) as he brought out image after of image, some over 50 years old. Where cell phones today are equipped with cameras, these images were captured, developed and nurtured, back when a photographer went into a darkroom to work his trade.

Negatives were enlarged and the photographer became the craftsman. If an area needed to be lightened, he would deflect light with his hands. If it needed more light, say around the edges or in a certain area, he would catch the light, then gently distribute more to the designated area, like Picasso working with fine brush strokes.

Then the paper would go into the developer mixed in a 3-to-1 ratio with water to bring out the high range of gray tones slowly. He’d gently rock the tray as the image began to rise, first the black, then the darker tones. And even though it’s not magic, it seemed magical as the image came to be.

As Bob reflected back when handcrafted meant something, his breath became a little shorter, the pause between thought more pronounced. The twinkle in his eye seemed to indicate a return to the fond memory, back to when black and white photography was crafted and not some button on Instagram.

Bob was also a well known saddle maker and leatherman (Ottmar Saddlery shop). He once wrote a Dutch oven cookbook.

He’d seen the world go from black and white television to the world wide web. His last rodeo was the 74th annual Moses Lake Roundup. Russell Cardoza and Jason Minor shared the all-around title. Garrett Tribble rode “Damn Straight” to an 89-point bull ride and the Moses Lake Roundup move one step closer to its 75th anniversary.

I’d like to think Bob just rode off into the sunset, but his story will be told over and over again, lest it not be forgotten.

Rodney Harwood is a sports writer for the Columbia Basin Herald and can be reached at rharwood@columbiabasinherald.com.