PENDLETON — Gerald “Pinky” Christopher has spent his life making others laugh. With fritzy eyebrows and wire-rimmed glasses peeking out from under his cowboy hat and a mischievous grin crowned by a white horseshoe mustache, Christopher is the definition of old school cowboy.

From his red kerchief to his cowboy boots, the soon-to-be 87-year-old’s life as a rodeo clown is etched into him. His youthful energy goes against a lifetime spent helping build the foundations of Oregon rodeo.

Born in Kansas in 1934, Christopher wasn’t even a year old when he and his mom, dad, two brothers, and uncle piled into a Model-A truck and moved across the country to Oregon, where they settled in the Willamette Valley. Outside of Eugene, his father owned a ranch that ran up against the nearby logging camps during World War II, but sold it and moved to Redmond after the war ended.

“On Friday I was going to high school in Elmira, Oregon, and Monday I was going to Redmond, Oregon,” Christopher said, “and so I finished high school in Redmond.”

It was as a senior in high school when Christopher truly began a lifetime in rodeo. When visiting Tygh Valley for a rodeo, he drew War Paint — the famous saddle bronc who won the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association Bucking Horse of the Year Award in 1956, 1957 and 1958 and is preserved at the Pendleton Round-Up Hall of Fame.

“I rode him to the whistle, and then I went sky and up in the air and 40 feet forwards,” Christopher said. “And I think I won all of $25.”

Christopher said he did bareback and saddle bronc and a few bulls before deciding to become a clown “to be in front of them instead of on top of them.”

It was the early 1950s when Christopher started his clowning career in the small town of Yoncalla in Douglas County. When the rodeo had no bulls, he asked the organizer if he needed any help with entertainment and in return got his entrance fees covered.

There was one lady, he said, who owned about two-thirds of the businesses in Yoncalla and had brought her grandson to the rodeo who was crying and whining and bawling.

“I started going by and I’d get up on a fencepost and sit there and he’d shoot me with his cap gun and I’d fall off and stuff,” Christopher said, “and pretty soon, before the second day was over with, why he was a-laughing and having a good time and his grandmother was enjoying the show.”

Christopher would spend the next 30 some odd years traveling around Oregon to rodeos, working as a bullfighter and rodeo clown, ingraining himself into Oregon rodeo life. It made him happy to help others have a good time, forget their troubles and enjoy the show, he said.

“If you just make them laugh for 10 minutes and forget their troubles,” he said, “why it was well worth it.”

Christopher said it was different then versus nowadays, where rodeo clowns, bullfighters and entertainment are separate. Back then, “you were the rodeo clown, you were the bullfighter and you were part of the entertainment, too.”

“He was a prankster, oh my god I could tell you a million stories,” said Robert Cosner, a retired member of the Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office who has known Christopher for more than 40 years.

One of these included building a washtub on a saddle and adding a sack of flour to the bottom. They’d sprinkle flour on Christopher, and he’d hop in the tub on top of a bucking horse with his legs poking out. He’d get bucked out and flour would go everywhere, Cosner said. He strapped heavy thick sponges to his back and the back of his legs to help avoid getting too banged up.

“Sometimes you get the wrong way, you know, eating a little dirt,” Christopher said, “but usually you tried to land on your feet.”

Christopher did anything he could think of to get people hooting and hollering and enjoying the show.

“Whatever you can come up with to keep the people entertained,” he said.

Even now, at 87 years old, Christopher never misses a rodeo, according to his daughter, Kellie Ridenour. He still loves making others laugh.

“I enjoyed it, the people enjoyed it,” he said. “If they were happy, I was happy.”