There may be life off the ranch, but any Fremont County farmer or rancher will tell you – The #aglife is “the good life!” #Aglife is a County 10 series, brought to you by Wyoming Community Bank, that pulls the curtain back on farm and ranch life in Fremont County.
Written by Randy Tucker
It’s almost a perfect storm, only this one isn’t far out in the Atlantic but rather in the ag community that makes Fremont County such a special place.
It’s the story of a girl from Crowheart and a boy from Sand Mesa, students at rival schools, but kids who noticed each other growing up.
Coleter Jordan, a 2017 Shoshoni High School graduate, and Hadlee Becker, a 2021 Wind River graduate, knew each other for a long time before they were married earlier this year in February.
Coleter was an outstanding football player for the Wranglers and a competitive bulldogger at junior high and later high school rodeos.
He was leading the region one year when he was injured on the gridiron.
“I popped my shoulder out against Rocky Mountain,” Coleter said. “It ended my rodeo season. I spent a lot of time in physical therapy getting dry needled just to play football.”
After graduation, Coleter had the dream of becoming an Alaskan bush pilot.
“I went to Casper College to be a pilot,” Coleter said. “After a year-and-a-half, I came home at semester, Christmas, my second year. I came back to calving and started running the ranch. I was driving back and forth and it got expensive. I had a couple of cross-country flights left, but I got busy.”
Life has a way of getting between a young man’s dreams and reality.
He came back to run the ranch with his father, Lance Jordan, and Coleter’s younger sister Lana.
You don’t find many girls or young women that can handle a rope better than Lana.
“She’s a better roper than I ever was,” Coleter said. “I went to the oil field for a little while, came back and thought I’d be a rodeo bum, riding bulls, but I wasn’t any good. Then I started chasing Hadlee around.”
Hadlee is the daughter of Jerry and Katie Becker. They have a place near Crowheart.
“It’s a mile west of the store, the south side of the road,” Hadlee said. “They rodeoed forever. They worked for a couple in Utah then moved back to Idaho where my mom’s from.”
In 2017, the Beckers began providing stock for the Dubois Rodeo.
“We did the rodeo production,” Hadlee said. “It was my family. They still put it on.”
It was the rodeo bulls that Jerry and Katie raised that caught Coleter’s eye.
“We had a bunch of cows for a long time, Grandpa (Gene Jordan) bought the place back in the 1970s,” Coleter said. “It was a government experimental peanut farm. Peanuts didn’t work out.”
On the east end of the Jordan place on Sand Mesa, there are still cement fence posts stamped with the Depression-era WPA symbol.
“My dad and uncle Tyler grew up around here,” Coleter said. “They had a mixed herd for a while, and Grandpa bred them all to Angus.”
Lance, Lana, and Coleter all have their own herds on the place.
When asked when they first met, Hadlee didn’t have a distinct memory.
“I don’t even know, I hung out with Lana in high school,” Hadlee said.
“We knew each other since we were little,” Coleter said. “I always thought of the world of the Beckers and noticed Hadlee.”
Hadlee headed off to the University of Wyoming in the fall of 2021, but it was a short stay.
“I went to UW for a couple of months and hated it,” Hadlee said. “I came home.”
It was just after Coleter returned from his quest to become a bush pilot.
“She came home and we hit it off,” Coleter said.
The couple lives on the original Jordan ranch at Sand Mesa.
“We remodeled the house and made it a home,” Coleter said. “Lana and Hank are across the driveway.”
They’re an extremely hard-working young couple.
Coleter has a fencing business in addition to farming and ranching, but their combined pride and joy is Jordan Bucking Bulls.
They have 17 bucking bulls now at their ranch.
“I bought the first two back in 2020, bought two more in 21, then two more in 23,” Coleter said. “We’ve bought a lot of bulls in Wyoming and a few in Colorado.”
They purchased four rodeo cows and started breeding their own bulls.
The first set of three-year-old bulls they raised themselves has arrived.
“We dummy bucked them a couple of months ago, and they’ll be outstanding,” Coleter said. “Just like anybody, I wanted to get into raising them.”
The Jordans are in the “bull game.”
Like any specialty, there is much more to raising bulls than meets the eye.
The rodeo world is constantly changing.
Originally, bulls were big, heavy, muscular Brahman stock. That’s changed a bit. There are still massive bulls found at bull riding events, but many of the bulls now are quicker, faster, and smaller.
Many competitive bulls are crosses between small Corriente and standard Brahman stock.
“A lot of guys will raise yearling futurity calves,” Coleter said. “Yearlings, two-year-olds, and three-year-old futurities. You can take your best two or three bulls to a match and they’ll judge the bulls.”
A futurity bull is evaluated by judges without a rider. They wear a remote release dummy box instead.
“They mark the bulls to decide the winner,” Coleter said. “The yearling game is getting intense. They’re building them like human athletes. These bulls can jump six feet in the air and do a full 360 turn. The genetics are insane. These animals are freaks of nature.”
Currently, D&H Cattle are the industry standard in bucking bulls.
“D&H are the best bucking bull breeders in the world hands down,” Coleter said. “A lot of the bulls are still Brahman bloodlines. My father-in-law has a three-year-old bull calf, Dalton, that is a Brahman/Corriente cross.”
An interesting look into Coleter’s early life came with a trip to New Jersey, where his grandmother Debbie is from.
“I started with mini bulls. I was never any good, but I enjoyed it,” Coleter said. “There’s a big rodeo at Cowtown, New Jersey. I brought my gear bag all the way from Wyoming. We were going to rodeo that night. I’m on the day sheet. My grandmother proceeds to tell me she’s not signing the release form. That melted my heart. I didn’t get on because Grandma wouldn’t sign the release.”
That’s a grandmother’s prerogative.
Currently, Coleter and Hadlee provide all the bulls for the Dubois Rodeo.
“We fill in for other contractors occasionally at other rodeos,” Coleter said. “We’ve developed enough of a herd where it’s just us now.”
The Beckers supply the bareback and saddle bronc stock. The roping and dogging steers are usually consigned.
“Most of the roping cattle stay at my parents’ house for the summer then they go back to Idaho,” Hadlee said.
In addition to breeding rodeo bulls, raising alfalfa and grain, running a fencing business, and doing the endless work of running a ranch, Coleter is also a championship-level coyote hunter.
He harvests dozens, sometimes over a hundred coyotes each winter.
He was more active before he and Hadlee were married but still finds time to hunt coyotes with his dad and friends.
“Raising bulls is a hobby. Some people have Harleys, some have boats, and I have bucking bulls,” Coleter said. “We do all right, but I don’t think I could make a living at it. We do OK. I like to hunt, I like to fish, and I like bucking bulls.”
The young couple is very grateful for the support and help their respective families have provided.
“I wouldn’t be involved if it wasn’t for Hadlee and my family,” Coleter said. “Jerry sold me the first two, and it was a domino effect. I really enjoyed it. I was blessed to buy two good ones. That second bull was a pet. He’d let you scratch him and knock the grain bucket out of your hand. He was Ferdinand. He was the perfect amateur rodeo bull. (a reference to the classic Disney cartoon Ferdinand the Bull).”
The Jordans notice the personalities that cattle and horses have.
“Animals have a personality. The cool part about bucking bulls is they all have different demeanors,” Coleter said.
They picked up a bull that was malnourished and didn’t trust people.
“He was hot. He wasn’t taken care of where he was,” Coleter said. “We put him on a feed program and he’s fine.”
They have a black baldy bull named Whistling Dixie that is a favorite of youngsters at the Dubois Rodeo.
“He’ll hug the fence and the four- and five-year-old and tourist kids love to scratch him,” Coleter said. “They’re neat; that’s why I fell in love with them. They become pets and part of the family.”
Coleter once again commented on the support of the Jordan and Becker families.
“Hadlee’s parents gave me the shot to buy a couple of bulls and my family let me have them on the place,” Coleter said. “They can be a pain. I really appreciate it. This is what makes things go around.“
Agriculture is a difficult field. It’s especially difficult for a young couple just getting started.
“If you don’t have a good support system you don’t go too far,” Coleter said. “Hadlee and I are blessed. It makes life easy and fun.”