Eaton’s Horse Drive Leaves Leiter on Saturday

The Eaton’s ranch horses arrived at Leiter on Friday night, May 19. It was the first leg of the journey that takes place each year between Eaton’s Bar 11 Ranch on Wildhorse Creek to the Eaton’s Dude Ranch near Wolf, Wyoming, outside of Dayton.

The horses were pastured near the Leiter Bar and Cafe, and the wranglers enjoyed a supper, drinks and slept overnight in the Leiter cabins.

Melanie Thomas Klier, owner of the Leiter Bar and Cafe talked about this year’s drive.

At 7 a.m. on Saturday the horses moved out of the Leiter pasture and headed north to Wyano. Wrangler Tom Alderson, Jr. has been helping with the drive for around 11 years. He worked for Eatons as a wrangler in the past and still enjoys helping with the drive.

When asked about the winter, which was unusually harsh this past year in Wyoming, Alderson said about the horses on the Echeta Bar 11 Ranch,

The weather for this year’s drive was sunny and warm, but one year they did have to cancel the drive and had to truck the horse’s home.

Rob Cagnina who has been doing the drive since 2007, or 2008, he currently lives in Maine, but he enjoys coming back to Wyoming and helping out the Eaton’s crew.

He talked about his year’s weather and the accommodations at Leiter

He said they have anywhere between six and eight riders, this year they have eight.

An old tradition in the Sheridan areas, Alderson added that the drive has been going on since the at least the 1930s.

The Museum at the Bighorns hosts a pancake breakfast every year and people can watch the horses come down Fifth Street from the Museum porch.