SCOTT - When you travel down Highway 347 heading to Scott, you will see a chuckwagon, with a Calgary Stampede tarp, sitting in the driveway of the home of Bill and Valerie Risling.
Bill has enjoyed the chuckwagon races, going to the Stampede in late June in Calgary, starting in the early 1980s. He is friends with chuckwagon legend Kelly Sutherland and his son Mark.
The story behind Bill's acquisition of the chuckwagon begins at Kenosee Lake where their son Josh and family live and work. A few doors down from their cabin sat a chuckwagon. Knowing his dad’s passion for the “chucks,” Josh pointed the treasure out to his dad the next time he visited.
Bill introduced himself to the owner and learned the wagon had belonged to Wayne Knight of St Walburg. It was one of his older wagons, used on the circuit beginning in Knight's rookie year of 1984.
Doug Sauter of the Express Ranch of Yukon, Okla. had bought the wagon from Knight.
After a few years of talking back and forth, Sauter gave Bill the wagon. The only condition on the gift was that it would never be sold. Bill is immensely proud of the wagon, as it brings back memories of watching the chucks at the Calgary Stampede.
