Leo Hancock Hayes, the last breeding son of legendary foundation sire, Blue Valentine, died Saturday, June 30, 2007, of an apparent heart attack. He was twenty-seven years old. Leo Hancock Hayes was foaled in 1980, the year Blue Valentine died. Vince Hayes of Thermopolis, owned Leo Hancock Hayes until he was twenty years old. Vince related an incident about Leo Hancock Hayes’ good sense, "1983-84 was particularly bad winter in Wyoming, with deep snows. I was riding Leo Hancock Hayes to check cattle and got bogged in the snow. My dad always told me not to get off in such a case because the horse would come right on top of you trying to get out of the snow. But I couldn’t move the horse so I got off and the horse just stood there until I got out of the way. Then I clucked to him and he got out of the drift on his own. He was very good minded. He got his right front foot cut very badly, nearly cut off that year. They did surgery on him but he was never able to be ridden afterwards but was kept as a stud." While under ownership of Vince Hayes, Leo Hancock Hayes stood at stud several years at the late Ray & Cheri Wardell’s ranch near Moorcroft, Wyoming. Advertisements for the stallion went as follows:
In 2001, we purchased Leo Hancock Hayes from Vince Hayes and began an aggressive breeding program centered around Leo Hancock Hayes. Through 2006, the aging stallion sired a lifetime total of 468 registered foals. Nearly half of them were born after he was twenty years old. Even at twenty-seven years old, nearly all of the thirty-five mares he bred this spring have been checked safe in foal for 2008. With the registration of the 2007 and 2008 foal crops his total foals will total well over 500. More than 50% have been roans. As with Blue Valentine, most of Leo Hancock Hayes’ get have been used as ranch or rodeo horses with no official AQHA record. However, some are making their mark in the show pen. Bar Star Danger, a 2002 bay roan stallion has points in Tie-down and Breakaway Roping. He qualified for the AQHA World show in Junior Tie-down Roping and earned his Register of Merit (ROM) in 2006. Blue Fox Hancock, a blue roan stallion has AQHA points in working cow horse and heeling and earned his AQHA Open Performance ROM in early 2007. A bay roan daughter, Bar Star Sadie and a red roan gelding Pros Velvet Seven, both have points in tie-down roping. And so it is with great sires that quietly go about their work, without heavy show schedules and large promotional budgets. Through their progeny, however late it comes, eventually their value is realized by the masses. That may very well be the case with Leo Hancock Hayes. In the words of the great western writer, Louis L'Amour, "There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning."
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