Artist's Statement:

In the late 1980’s, several people came to me asking about my doing a bronze of Ben Johnson on a horse. I thought that would be the natural way to portray old Ben and I chose to mount him in the bronze on his movie horse, Blackie. Ben’s nephew, Ben Miller had Blackie running out with some other roping horses and I picked him out because he looked more like a typical ranch horse.

As it turned out, Blackie was the very one that Ben rode in numerous movies including “Hang ‘em High”, “The Sacketts” and several others in which Ben had co-starred with the Duke, John Wayne. Ben was much more worried about how I would make old Blackie look in the bronze rather than himself. He had made only one remark to me about that, “Just don’t make my belly too big.”

I used plenty of old photographs of Blackie when he was younger that showed his athletic build as well as listening to Ben, Director Bob Totten, Ben Miller and other folks that knew that horse so well. I did get the honor to meet Blackie shortly before he passed away at the old age of 30 years.
 
The number 1 casting of the bronze “Ben and Blackie, A Pair of Aces” was donated by the artist and his wife, Sheri to the auction portion of the “Ben Johnson Pro-Celebrity Roping” charity fund-raising event held at the then “National Cowboy Hall of Fame” (now the “National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum”) in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1990. The bronze sold for $30,000.00 to Eddie Gaylord II who called Ben up to the stage accompanied by the artist, and presented it saying to him, “Ben, you’re the number one Cowboy, so this is for you. Take it home to Carol (Ben’s beloved wife).” This is a photograph taken at that moment when Ben rarely broke into tears in front of anyone. Needless to say, Ben Johnson received a thunderous standing ovation.

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Serious inquires only should be directed to the artist or sheri@jimmydoncox.com. Phone (830) 481-3112