Back When They Bucked with RL Tolbert

RL Tolbert has jumped out of burning buildings, tumbled down cliffs, crashed cars and been shot numerous times.
But he’s walked away from every near-death experience.
That’s because the Vale, Oregon cowboy served as a stuntman in the movie industry as well as being a rodeo contestant.
That’s him getting the girl out of the wagon in “Back to the Future III”, before the wagon goes over the cliff. That’s him driving the six-horse hitch in the same movie, and tumbling down a staircase in “Silverado.”
He’s been a stunt double and worked as a stuntman in such movies as “The Sacketts” (1979), “Shadow Riders” (1982), “Silverado” (1985), “Three Amigos” (1986), “Mask of Zorro” (1998), “Conagher” (1991), “The Quick and the Dead” (1987), “Lonesome Dove” (1982), “Back to the Future II and III” (1989, 90), “The Rookie” (1990), “Far and Away,” (1992), “Tombstone” (1993), and many more.
Born in 1941 in Fountain, Colo., both of his grandfathers worked with horses: AR Ward, as a farmer, and Ed Tolbert, building roads in Kansas with horsepower and later driving a coach at the Royal Gorge’s Buckskin Joe tourist attraction.
By the time he was in his early teens, he was working at local dairies while attending school. He worked at the Littleton race track, then spent a year in Watsonville, Calif., with his mother, after his parents divorced. By age 15, he was back in Colorado, working at the Appelt Ranch.
In his twenties, RL broke horses for ranches all over Colorado. He spent time on the Butler Ranch, the Trinchera Ranch, the McQuaid Ranch, anywhere where they still fed cattle or hayed with horsepower.
Situated in the Rockies, with long, snowy winters, RL had told his fellow ranch cowboys, “when the first snowflake hits me, the second flake will be in my tracks because I’m leaving here.”
So that winter, he went to Colorado Springs, where he found an indoor arena, local cowboys held jackpots, and RL fine-tuned his saddle bronc riding.
“I knew how to ride horses that bucked,” he said, from breaking them. The learning part that took place at the arena was how to use the equipment and working on his technique.
RL also rode bulls as well, anything to make a little money.
While there, in 1964, he met another bull rider from Iowa, who talked him into going back to Iowa. There, he worked for PRCA stock contractor Bob Barnes, as a pickup man, driving truck, feeding and loading cattle, doing whatever was needed, and sometimes working five events: the three roughstock events, plus tie-down roping and steer wrestling, at Barnes rodeos where contestants were lacking. He had gotten his Rodeo Cowboys Association (predecessor to the PRCA) card in 1962.
After a year of that, he went to work for Jake and Lynn Beutler and Beutler Brothers, driving truck and picking up. He rode saddle broncs and bulls at the Beutler rodeos where he worked.
From the late 1960s to 1970, RL worked for Larry Mahan in Phoenix in the trailer business, then moved to California in the early 70s, using the Golden State as his rodeo base.
While he was rodeoing in California, he went to work for Cotton Rosser and the Flying U Rodeo Co., driving the chariots that Cotton used for his specialty act.
Through rodeo friends, RL got hired at Great Adventure, a huge amusement park in New Jersey. The park had a wild west show, with chariot racing, jousting, Roman riding, and a stagecoach hold-up, and RL got hired to help with that. He spent three years, from 1975-1977, working at the park, and on the weekends, he headed to Cowtown, N.J., for the weekly rodeos.
In those days, cowboys would winter in Tucson during the winter rodeo run, while they hit the rodeos in Odessa, Denver, El Paso, Scottsdale, and Phoenix. While RL was there, he made friends with several stuntmen, including Chuck Hayward, who was John Wayne’s main stuntman.
He also became friends with Glenn Randall, Sr., a trainer who had trained Roy Rogers’ and other celebrities’ horses, and Glenn’s son, Glenn, Jr. He learned more about horsemanship and training by working with Glenn, Sr.
Once RL got his Screen Actors Guild card, Hayward helped get him established in the movie industry.
He was a stuntman for dozens of movies, rigging wagon wrecks, car wrecks, falling horses, and more.
He doubled for Sam Elliott, Barry Corbin, Christopher Lloyd, and others. He doubled for Lloyd when Lloyd played “Doc” in the “Back to the Future III” movie and rigged the six horses to the DeLorean car, hooking the car’s steering into the wagon tongue.
He trained horses to fall and had three special ones. El Guapo was his favorite. A bucking horse, he used him for bucking in the movies till he later turned him into a liberty horse. The horse was “a really good raring horse,” he said. “He was excellent.
Juan was one of his falling horses. A thoroughbred, the horse was hard to work with. RL would get mad at him and vow to sell him, “then he’d bail me out.” Roanie was another of his beloved horses; as a four-year-old, Sam Elliott rode him for the movies “Quick and the Dead,” and “Conagher.” Roanie and El Guapo are buried side by side.
For about twenty years, from 1979 to the early 2000s, a lot of the six-horse hitches in the movies were driven by RL.
He became a member of the Screen Actors Guild in 1975, the Stuntman’s Association of Motion Pictures in 1977, and is also a member of the Directors’ Guild of America.
In 2002, he and his wife Kim, who had married in 1986, moved to Oregon. RL had admired the country when he had been there in his rodeo days.
On his farm near Vale, he raised alfalfa, oats and wheat, horses, goats and llamas. In 2015, they sold the farm.
From his first marriage, RL has two daughters, Robin and Stephanie. With Kim, he has a son, Elliott, and a daughter, Tessa. Kim passed away in 2021. The couple has seven grandkids.
RL still craves getting on saddle broncs. “I loved riding broncs,” he said. “I’d still get on one. That’s what I miss most, more than anything. And maybe meeting a lot of girls,” he chuckled.
He’s had a good life. “You really can’t beat it. It was all good times.”
RL was a 2018 Silver Spur recipient for his work in various western movies as a stuntman. Examples of his stunt work can be found at https://www.reelcowboys.org/members/LifetimeMembers/TolbertRL.php