When the Indian relay races return to the Sheridan WYO Rodeo next month, it will be without the event's longtime announcer of the past 30 years, who quit over an interaction with local law enforcement he claims had "racist overtones."
Kennard Real Bird said he will not return as announcer after the rodeo's directors declined to stand behind him and call out the Sheridan County Sheriff's Office for what Real Bird claims was inappropriate treatment of him after a 2025 arrest.
“I just had an issue with local law enforcement,” said Real Bird, an artist whose 2011 painting "Crow War Pony" hangs in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. “I live on an island, so to speak, here on the reservation, and we don’t encounter racism here on a daily basis.”
"As a result of this incident with racist overtones, I decided to not go back for any further humiliation by the Sheridan community," he adds in a June 19 Facebook post about the interactions.
Real Bird, 76, of the Crow Reservation in southeastern Montana, began calling Sheridan’s Indian relay races with his own brand of politically incorrect but engaging humor when the races were added to the rodeo in 1997.
Real Bird told Cowboy State Daily he isn't retiring. He plans to call Indian relay races this summer at Cheyenne Frontier Days — which just added the event on both weekends — and at Wyoming Downs, plus rodeos in North Dakota, Montana and Alberta.
In September, Real Bird will announce the 10th annual Championship of Champions, a three-day event held for the first time at Cheyenne’s Frontier Park.
But he won't be in Sheridan.
“I’ve been in a grieving period knowing I’m not going back to Sheridan,” Real Bird said. “I love that audience — their love for the sport and the respect they give the Indian kids.”
'Insulted An Humilitated'
Real Bird said he was pulled over in July 2025 by the Wyoming Highway Patrol leaving the rodeo over a bench warrant for his arrest based on an unpaid 2018 speeding ticket.
He said paid the ticket in 2022, when while attempting to renew his Montana driver’s license he was told by his DMV the Wyoming fine must be paid first.
“I paid it electronically,” he said. “A couple of days later, I went back to the DMV and they said, ‘OK, Wyoming has released your hold because you paid the fine.’ And they renewed my license.”
Nevertheless, Real Bird said he was handcuffed and taken to the Sheridan County Detention Center, where he was “insulted and humiliated” when stripped of his belt and boots and handcuffed to a counter.
“I asked, ‘Is this necessary?’” he recalled. “I’m 76 years old. I’ve been sober 49 years of my life. I was not a flight risk or a threat. I don’t know why they would want to treat me like that, other than me being an Indian.”
Deputy Dillon Buckmeier of the Sheridan County Sheriff’s Department said it's the same standard procedure for all bookings.
“We do a pat-down, take a photo, put them in a changing room to remove clothes, which we search, and we cuff them to a chair or the counter while they’re booked,” Buckmeier told Cowboy State Daily. “It’s safer if they’re secured.”
It was the second time in recent years an incident in Sheridan offended Real Bird, he said.
For decades, the former bronc rider, who still raises bucking horses, would make his way down behind the chutes to watch the rodeo’s bronc riding. One time, he had his young grandsons in tow.
PRCA rules forbid kids behind the chutes, so security removed the Real Bird family.
Sheridan WYO Rodeo Executive Director Zane Garstad and WYO Indian Relay Director Jess Sams talked Real Bird into returning to keep announcing the races after that.
And Sams asked him to return in 2026 as well, telling Real Bird the rodeo board doesn't get involved in what happens outside the fairgrounds.
'He's One Of A Kind'
Real Bird's successor announcing the Indian races at the WYO Rodeo will be Randy Taylor, a University of Wyoming graduate and former National Finals Rodeo bareback rider of Cherokee descent.
Taylor has known Real Bird since he was invited to Montana by the Crow Tribe to ride bucking horses and put up teepees in the 1980s.
“Indian relay is our country’s original extreme sport,” Taylor said. “Kennard’s family has been riding, raiding or bucking horses for 400 years. When the board asked me to do the job, I called Kennard first. I wanted his blessing and received it.
"I’ll try to follow his path, but I’m not able to fill his moccasins. He’s one of a kind.”
Garstad said in a recent statement about Taylor that the WYO’s growth is largely due to Real Bird’s contributions.
Garstad pointed out the community continues to invest annually in the Indian Village and First Peoples’ Pow Wow. And Isabella Yellowtail, this year’s Miss Sheridan WYO Rodeo, is the second queen to hail from the Crow Reservation and first since Lucy Yellow Mule in 1951.
Sams said Real Bird will always have a home at the Sheridan WYO, and Real Bird said he remains fond of the event. Aware of rumors that some Indian relay teams might boycott because of his departure, Real Bird discourages the idea.
“Sheridan is one of the greatest places for Indian relay,” he said. “The athleticism and choreography are amazing. In the 1990s, a lot of the Indians were boozed up and not worthy. I wanted Native American teams to gain some respect. Over the years, we’ve developed professionalism.
"I wanted to be part of that voice to elevate their stature. That’s what I think I did.”
But he is standing firm on not returning.
“All I wanted was the board to stand behind me,” he said. “If they’re not willing to upset the law enforcement community, then I’m not willing to go back.
“I feel I’m justified in not going back. But I’m not putting a blanket indictment on the community of Sheridan. I just wanted the board whom I’ve dealt with for 30 years to have said, ‘Wait a minute, Mr. Law Enforcement, it wasn’t right what you did to Mr. Real Bird. He’s a valuable member of our community.'”
