Sean Ryon Western Store & Saddle Shop

Sean Ryon Western Store & Saddle Shop stands at 2707 North Main Street in the Fort Worth Stockyards. The trade behind it starts with Windy Ryon. He rodeoed for several years and then bought the Joe Edelbrock saddle shop. A few years later he sold it and opened his own store, named Windy Ryon's, in the Fort Worth Stockyards in 1944. The Texas Rodeo Cowboy Hall of Fame records it as a gathering place for cowboys and ranch hands, with Windy usually in the store and trading stories. His friends held the first Windy Ryon Memorial Roping in his memory in 1973, and that roping still runs each year with a scholarship programme attached. In 1959 Windy expanded the business with his son Don Jackson Ryon III, known as Whistle. In 1989 Sean Ryon continued the family line by opening the present store. Saddles are built by hand and fitted to a horse and its rider, and the shop points customers to its own gallery or to a show pen to see the work. Hand creased hats and made to measure boots complete the trade. One family has kept the shop in the Stockyards for three generations.