[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 32 (Friday, March 12, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2762-S2763]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO JIM TESCHER

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, on another subject, I will now make some 
comments about a North Dakotan who has died. I want to do this for a 
very special reason. I think his passing needs to be noted by us.
  Willie Nelson has a song called ``My Heroes Have Always Been 
Cowboys.'' Out in my part of the country--I grew up in western North 
Dakota--we understand Willie Nelson's music and lyrics and what his 
songs mean. Willie Nelson really gave voice, with ``My Heroes Have 
Always Been Cowboys'' to a way of life--about rodeos, ranch life, 10-
gallon hats, pickup trucks, sweet clover, wild horses, newborn calves, 
going to town on Saturday night, good neighbors, strong families, and 
living free.
  I grew up in a small area of western North Dakota. My dad was a good 
horseman. He raised horses. When I was a young boy, we went to rodeos. 
We did not have professional sports. We did not have Major League 
Baseball or the National Football League. We went to rodeos.
  I recall as a young boy going to the rodeos in all the small towns in 
North Dakota, but also going to the National Western Livestock Show in 
the coliseum in Denver, CO. Cy Tallon was the announcer, one of the 
great rodeo announcers in our country. He would announce, ``Coming out 
of chute No. 2, Jim Tescher from North Dakota.''
  We had cowboys who were the best in the world--Jim Tescher, Tom 
Tescher, Alvin Nelson, Duane Howard, Dean Armstrong--tops in the world. 
I remember how proud I had been hearing these North Dakotans being 
introduced at the National Western Livestock Show--saddle-bronc riders, 
bareback riders, and bull riders. They were the best in the world--
tough, good people and champions.
  Last month, one of them died. In a cemetery in the Badlands of North 
Dakota up on a hill, his casket sat to be buried. His name was Jim 
Tescher. He came from a ranch in the Badlands of North Dakota. He rode 
in rodeos in Madison Square Garden, the Boston Garden, and the Cow 
Palace. He won the saddle-bronc riding in the National Finals Rodeo 
twice. He was a real champion. He went for 2 years at one stretch as a 
professional RCA cowboy without being bucked off a saddle-bronc horse. 
Think of that: 2 years without being bucked off a saddle bronc riding 
in rodeos.
  His first love was the ranch, the cows, and the horses, so he rodeoed 
when he could. He didn't rodeo as much as some of the others, but when 
he did, he was a winner. After a long rodeo career, he returned to his 
ranch to live in the Badlands.
  Last summer, he was driving a little four-wheeler out in the Badlands 
to check on some cattle and it tipped, fell down a cliff, and pinned 
him and paralyzed him from the neck down. I went to visit him at 
Thanksgiving time in the hospital in Mandan, ND. Jim was lying in his 
hospital room paralyzed. He said to me that what he really wanted to do 
was try to get back to the ranch and the Badlands and look out

[[Page S2763]]

the picture window and see his cattle once again.
  On December 23, they put Jim in a wheelchair and wheeled him down to 
the front door of the hospital wrapped in a blanket. Unbeknownst to 
him, his daughter had fetched his horse Bonner, a horse just over 20 
years old. Bonner had been with Jim all of his life. She brought his 
horse Bonner in from 180 miles away. She hauled him in a horse trailer.
  His daughter had Bonner standing behind a tree. They wheeled Jim out 
in a wheelchair and led Bonner out from behind the tree. This horse had 
not seen his master for about 5, 6 months. Jim could not lift his 
hands, but he made that clicking sound with his mouth that cowboys make 
to their horse, and Bonner walked over and nuzzled him on the nose. He 
still knew Jim after 6 months in the hospital. Jim had tears in his 
eyes that day.
  About 4 days later, Jim died, and on January 3, a group gathered in 
the cemetery in the Badlands to bury him. This picture which was in the 
Cowboy Chronicle in North Dakota shows a man named Brad Gjermundson, 
also a North Dakotan, a four-time world saddle bronc champion rider. He 
rode to that cemetery following the hearse leading Jim's horse Bonner. 
As Jim was to be buried that day in a coffin decorated with his well-
worn cowboy boots, some spurs, a rope, and some cedar from the 
Badlands, the cowboys from North Dakota gathered around to pay their 
last respects.
  This picture shows a lonely horse watching his master being put away. 
When I saw that picture in the Cowboy Chronicle, I knew I wanted to 
share with my colleagues the fact that this country has lost a really 
great champion, a champion rodeo rider, but also a champion human 
being.
  Teddy Roosevelt once lived in those Badlands, and Teddy Roosevelt 
once said: Cowboys don't walk real well; that's because they do most of 
their work in the saddle. He could have said: Cowboys don't talk much 
either; they just love their country, they honor family values, and 
they live free. And that describes Jim Tescher's life. He, in my 
judgment, is one of those real American heroes, a North Dakota 
champion, and our State will miss him.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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