‘Amarillo by Morning’: The Chronicles of Rodeo Cowboy

Fast shipping rates helped inspire Terry Stafford’s classic cowboy anthem.

Detail of "A Bunch of Bucking Broncho Busters" from a circa early 1900s postcard by the Detroit Publishing Company. New York Public Library. Public Domain

In the early 1970s, singer-songwriter Terry Stafford drove the long, flat roads of Texas, making his way home to Amarillo after performing at a rodeo in San Antonio. As he made the journey, he turned over lyric ideas in his mind about his trip, and the opening lines of a future top-five country hit began to form: “Amarillo by morning/ Up from San Antone.”

One of country music’s iconic lines comes from Stafford’s “Amarillo by Morning,” a song chronicling the life of a rodeo cowboy, and the hard-won, rugged freedom of the lifestyle: “I ain’t rich but Lord, I’m free.”