The "chicken pull", as it is called in English, was still being practiced in
New Mexico fifteen years ago in both Hispanic and Pueblo Indian
communities. One was held at Santo Domingo Pueblo in about 1983,
when I was living in Santa Fe. Three years ago the National Museum of
American History made a film about Hispanic communities in New Mexico
icalled "Only Death Will Take Me From This Place" in which Fortunato
Gallegos of Villanueva describes a chicken pull as one of the sports that
was customarily practiced in Villanueva on the feast day of San Juan,
June 24. In his description, a group of horsemen compete to pull the
rooster out of the sand and the one who gets then then has to prevent
the others from taking it away from him. I do not think any chicken pulls
have taken place in recent years, due largely to pposition by animal rights
groups. I believe that there is also a nineteenth-century painting by
Theodore Gentliz showing the sport as practiced in San Antonio, Texas,
in the 1850's. I'll check on this and get you the reference. -Lonn Taylor,
National Museum of American History