Chester Hape - Sheridan Wyoming
March 3, 1935 – November 23, 2017
A child of the Great Depression, Chester Hape did not believe in waste. He did not waste money, he did not waste words and he did not waste time. Instead, in the full life that he lived, Chester believed in constant action and hard work.
After serving in the U.S. Army, Chester tried his hand at leather craft, pursuing it with the same passion for perfection with which he approached all of his endeavors. He eventually was commissioned to create the championship saddles for the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association for 13 years.
Today, his leatherwork is appreciated across the world, with people coming to Sheridan from as far away as Japan and Germany to see his art. Most telling, some of Chester’s work can be found in the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame.
Chester developed his work ethic and attention to detail growing up on the family ranch outside of Sheridan, where as a boy, he loved to hunt and fish, play music, and later competed in rodeo and served as a hunting guide.
After high school, Chester served as paratrooper for three years in the 11th airborne in the U.S. Army. Stationed in Germany, he earned recognition for skiing and marksmanship. Returning to the United States, Chester married his wife, Wanda Packard, in 1959, moving the couple into a small home west of Sheridan that he built the summer before. While there, Chester and Wanda had three children: Camille, Juanita and Wayne.
Chester spent his days overseeing the family ranch while working full-time for Ernst Saddlery. He learned to build saddles and developed his tooling and stamping skills from some of the other notable saddle makers in the area, refining the style and helping to put the region on the map.
Chester built his second home in Wyarno on a piece of property purchased from his father. He helped with the local 4H, with all three children as members, and was a founding board member of the Sheridan County Rodeo.
With his children grown, at age 50, Chester decided to take swimming lessons at the YMCA because he “never learned to swim properly.” He loved the water and began competing in triathlons as the swim leg. He would eventually compete in triathlons individually in all three events. He took up wind surfing in the 1990s, learning the sport from a close-knit group of friends who would meet at Lake DeSmet outside Buffalo every time there was wind. He would rise each morning and turn on the Weather Channel just to check the wind speed. This interest in wind surfing led to multiple trips to Baja, Mexico; Hood River, Oregon; and South Padre Islands, Texas. He took singular trips to Aruba, Dominican Republic and Venezuela.
After Wanda died in 2006, Chester built his third house at Lake DeSmet to be closer to the water. He eventually moved back to Sheridan when the symptoms of his Parkinson’s Disease became too difficult for him to manage. He moved in with his son, Wayne, and daughter-in-law, Kena, in 2011, and as his mobility, eyesight and dexterity declined, Chester found pleasure in overseeing Wayne’s various projects, and taking part in every one of his grandson Waylon’s childhood milestones and activities.
William Chester Hape died at the age of 82 on Nov. 23, 2017. He was born March 3, 1935.
He is survived by his sister, Jackie Perry of Sheridan; his three children, Wayne Hape and Juanita Balding of Sheridan, and Camille Van Houten of Casper; and five grandchildren, Bethany, Eva Marie, Chester, Cathleen and Waylon.
He was preceded in death by his wife, Wanda; his father, Tuck; and his mother, Helen.
Chester left a short note to his children before he died, outlining his wishes.
A man who did not believe in waste, he asked for no funeral service, and only to be buried next to Wanda.
A short grave side service was held Friday, Dec. 1st, 2017 at 11 a.m. at the Sheridan Cemetery.
In lieu of flowers, friends were asked to make a donation to Meals on Wheels of Sheridan or Greenhouse Living of Sheridan.
In his note, Chester also offered a simple plea to his family: “Take care of one another, always.” Just as he lived his life.
Following Contributed by: Jane and Michael Stern - the authors of Way Out West (1993); Happy Trails: Our Life Story (1994), with Roy Rogers and Dale Evans; and Dog Eat Dog (1997).
Chester Hape, who is retired but still does leatherwork for pleasure, learned much from Don King. Hape carves the intricate flower pattern that is the hallmark of the Sheridan style, but his designs appear to be continuous, with every vine and leaf and flower connected. "I will break up a vine with another vine," he told us in his studio, "but only with a single vine, so the flow is never broken. I like to loop things through other things, so your eye never stops." Hape, who is known for the precision of his carving, explains that his attraction to leatherwork came as no surprise. "All my family on my mother's side were carpenters and artists. I liked to draw and make things from the time I was little. Growing up around horses and ranches and rodeo, it seemed natural to put that feeling into saddles."
Like Don King, Hape is always ready to remind admirers that his saddles are built to work. He bristles at the notion that saddlemaking is something people do as a hobby. "I call that the Tandy syndrome," he says, referring to the Tandy Leather & Crafts catalogues long popular among home hobbyists. "You have no idea how a saddlemaker has to work for years refining and developing his art. That is why there are so few good ones."
Most of the men who are now known for making Sheridan saddles, in fact, at one time worked with or for Don King. The trophy saddles King made in the 1950s and 1960s for world-champion rodeo cowboys set the standard for the highly refined floral style. Chester Hape explains that King's generosity as a teacher is part of what has made Sheridan such a productive leatherworkers' community. "Here you work on something and you think, 'All the other saddlemakers are going to see this. It better be good!' There is a lot of competition in this town, but it's friendly competition, the kind that makes you better."