Steven C. James was born on March 20, 1950, in Jackson Hole, Teton County, Wyoming. At the time, his parents and extended family owned a ranch just south of Jackson Hole. This provided many opportunities for Steve to learn and grow up around an agriculture lifestyle with a cow calf pair operation.
Steve is the oldest son of Carrol and Hazel James with two sisters, Carloyn and Anna, and a younger brother, Kenny. While ranching near Jackson, Steve started cowboying at a very young age. He would help his parents and his aunts and uncles move about fifteen hundred pair of momma cows, horseback, through the town of Jackson Hole to and from a forest permit in Moran, Wyoming.
When Steve was 7 years old, the family moved to Sublette County, near Daniel, Wyoming, where they purchased a ranch up Horse Creek, just east of the Wyoming Mountain range and west of the Wind River Mountains at about eight thousand feet in elevation. He lived with his family in what is now the milk barn at the original “Kelly Place” near the Green River. Steve rode his horses and helped his family with the ranch. His aunt and uncle had a ranch just up the road from where he grew up and also another uncle had a ranch about 20 minutes east, near Pinedale. These family connected ranches are where Steve spent most of his days learning how to ranch and becoming a better cowboy and horseman.
Kent Snidecor recalls this information about his buddy Steve. “Steve’s father entered Wyoming’s Teton County as a child via covered wagon from Utah. The family ranched there, on what is now known as the Melody Ranch. His father sold the ranch in Jackson and moved to Sublette County, purchasing several ranches near Daniel. The James family was growing and needed more land. On the ranch there were some 80 head of unbroken, potential saddle horses and work horses. Steve, his father, and uncles transformed them into working livestock for the ranch. The family knew nothing but hard work. Eventually Steve’s father, Carroll James, turned over the ranch to Steve, his brother Kenny, and cousin Bill.”
Steve grew to love ranch horses and cowboying, riding through the mountains, valleys and meadows in Sublette County. Growing up, he worked for his Dad, Carroll James. His main job was breaking colts and moving cows to and from the Hoback Basin, horseback. He worked with many local Sublette County cowboys and cattlemen.
After high school, Steve continued to break colts and cowboy and ranch for his father and the neighbors. He rode some bareback horses at the rodeo but soon found he loved just cowboying on his ranch horses. He rode many horses and doctored calves and yearlings by roping them out in the pasture. As a young man, Steve loved to rope calves in the branding pen each spring, and still to this day, he continues to rope calves all over Sublette County. For the majority of Steve’s life, he lived on the James Ranch and worked for his father. Katherine Campbell Bond gathered the following information about Steve cowboying in the Hoback Basin stating, “when Steve was in high school his interest in cowboying and horses was obvious.”
Always interested in the breaking of colts, he spent lots of time with horses and cows. He soon became interested in learning how to break colts and help horses extend their cow sense through cattle cutting, sorting, and roping. He used the ranch job as a way to perfect his cowboying skills and horsemanship. Steve enjoyed the study of horses and cattle, and always wanted to better his horses, so the jobs on the ranch could be easily completed.
He loved working his work horse team to pull the hay sled and feed cows too. Kent Snidecor tells the story of, “a time when work horses were used to feed winter hay, and Steve generally used a 4-horse team. When the snow got really deep, he would use a 6-up team.
Remembering back to the winter of ’76 or ’77, the temperature dropped to -65 below in Sublette County, and stayed that cold for three days. It was said that whiskey froze in the Boulder Bar that year. It was so cold you wore everything you owned. Steve and I had a burn barrel on the back of the hay sled to burn the 70-pound hay bales bailing twine. That is where we took turns warming up, and of course, breathing all that nasty burning twine smoke. We fed the mother cows and heifers at the Scott Place, then would go to the house around noon and eat. We would then travel via team and sled to the Apperson place to feed the bulls and the horses. We usually got done feeding by about 3:30 in the afternoon, unless some catastrophe happened. The distance travelled was around 5 miles round trip. The daily work demanded that you stay in shape (and not party much).”
His friend, Gene Potter remembers when shortly after high school he was working for the James ranch and he and Steve had the responsibility of feeding part of the cattle during the winter of 1972. It was a heavy snow winter. They fed with 4 head of horses. Steve was also a teamster. The snowstorm broke with rain and heavy Daniel winds. The winds took the wet snow and rolled it into snow balls all across the meadow where they were feeding the cattle. Then came the freeze in March. The snow was so hard the cattle could go anywhere including into the stack yard. Steve and Gene had to dig with a snow shovel all around the stackyard to keep the cattle out. They fed on top of the crusted snow as well. When one runner of the feed sleigh began to fall through the crusted snow and make it more difficult for the horses, the boys went to town and got heavy sheet metal, bolted it together and set it up so the horses could pull it. And pull it they did, it was a runaway that Gene remembers to this day.
Steve rode and roped with many great friends and neighbors. He learned to pregnancy check cattle and could stitch up a horse or a cow when needed with no veterinarian support. The ranch ran cattle on Rye Grass in the spring after calving, before going to summer pasture. Clay Price was in charge of the cattle. Steve and Gene used to go up and help with the sorting before they moved to summer pasture. They stayed there for a few days with Clay and he offered them inspiration, if they lacked any.
When Steve’s family moved to Daniel in the spring of 1957, they acquired a grazing permit in the Hoback Basin. They gathered cattle off the allotment the fall of 1957. The James Koch Ranch grazed cattle in other areas besides the Basin. Steve’s Uncle George was the one from the ranch that went to the Basin to help the association riders situate the cattle in the summer and gather the cattle on the fall roundup. By the time Steve was 12 he was helping his Uncle George work cattle in the Basin. He remembers staying at the old Muddy Cow Camp.
Kent Snidecor remembers a time while with Steve in the Basin, “every Fall, after Fall roundup, and when the snow had fallen, Steve and the Association cowboy would usually fly the back country, looking for cattle. It was huge country with high, wind-blown mountain peaks and many drainages. The country was such that it required a hell of lot of riding. It required ten to fifteen cowboys riding for 16 days or more to gather the bulk of the cattle, comprised of permits of twelve or more ranches. 2500-3500 head, including yearlings, bulls, cows and calves.”
One time in December, while Steve and Kent were flying, they spotted two pairs (cows and calves) and a yearling, maybe two. They were snowbound up a drainage called Claus Creek. Steve and Kent rode all day, bucking chest high snow with their horses, and finally located the cattle late in the afternoon. “They were standing under a tree, nearly starved to death. The temperature had dropped and it was damn cold. The cattle followed us out of there, and if there was even a twig poking out of the snow, they would devour whatever was available. They all survived and we got them to their prospective owners.”
By the time Steve was an adult, all the old-timers on the Hoback Stock Association held a deep respect for him even at such a young age. There are many miles of high country and good grass on the allotment. Not only did Steve know all of the country at a young age but he was one of the best cowboys on the cattle drives. He always rode good horses even before he started training cutting horses.
One rancher Lennie Campbell stated, “Steve James always rode the best cow horses in the Basin by far.” He would usually be found taking the lead over the top of the mountain on the summer moves. He would be with the cowboys who went where the late cattle were spotted after snowfall, breaking trail with their horses for the cattle to follow back. The cattlemen of the Basin respected him and enjoyed him, and even though he was from Daniel, he was considered a Basin cowboy to the people and still is to this day. He rode a big sorrel horse named Padro, who also made a name for himself. When it was time to work the cattle and take them home during the fall round up, Steve would work their pairs out on Padro. Even though he had not started professional cutting yet, when a yearling or an old dry cow would try to duck past Steve and Padro it is said that old Padro would jump 15 feet to the side to stop her. And they usually did.”
The James’s and Jewett’s moved their cattle out over the rim towards Daniel via the Noble trail once they were gathered. It was empty without Steve’s skill and fun-loving nature for a long time after the James family made the decision to sell their permit on the Stock Association.
Recently, Saunders Ranch acquired a large grazing permit on the Hoback allotment and began running yearlings on it. In the fall, Steve began to come to the Basin and help out with their shipping and part of the Roundup. It was like the cowboy had come home to even the new young cowboys riding on the association.
Steve, in a humble way, is always willing to share his wisdom for making a cow horse with anyone who approaches him with questions. He is never one to boast about any of his qualifications that make him a legend, but it is obvious even from a distance. The few ranch people left in the Basin will always think of Steve as one of their own.
As Steve started to take over his part of the family ranch, he continued to ride lots of horses and cowboy. He eventually developed an interest in working cow horses, leading into cutting horses which became his primary business as a trainer for himself and the public, nationwide. His horsemanship developed over time and he took it upon himself to go work for Les Voght to learn more about horsemanship and connecting with a horse. He used his cowboy skills within the cutting world by knowing how to read a cow and use it to his advantage in the cutting pen. He has taken these talents and passed them on to his children who have become nationally recognized in the horse and cutting industry.
Midlife, Steve was diagnosed with skin cancer and went under many treatments in Salt Lake City, Utah but that didn’t stop him from riding his horses and continuing his horse training business. He took a few horses with him and rode when he felt like he could. His love for cowboying, training and riding horses helped keep his mind straight during tough times.
He loves to teach horses and people about cowboying. To this day, he is still cowboying at the family ranch in Daniel, Wyoming. Come branding season you can find him on a horse roping those calves, doing what he loves!
Steve keeps a close friendship with his neighbors, always willing to help move or work cattle even at negative thirty-degree weather. He is known for bringing a smile to peoples’ faces no matter the circumstances. He continues to share his cowboying way of life with everyone around him. He has shared his knowledge and cowboy skills with many generations including his 5 children, 7 grandkids, 2 great grandkids and many other individuals along the way. Still, to this day, he teaches the old and the young, the cowboy code of ethics while riding down the trail following cattle with other cowboys beside him. Steve has also just recently retired after fifty plus years from being a professional cutting horse trainer.
Steve has been married to Mavis James for 35 years. They continue to live on the ranch and live the cowboy way.