Rex Trailer - Early Life

Early Life

Rex Trailer grew up just outside of Fort Worth, Texas. He spent his summers on his grandfather’s fifty-acre quarter horse ranch in nearby Thurber, Texas. There at age four or five Trailer rode his first horse, which was named "Bamboo".

The hired hands on the ranch were rodeo cowboys. One of these men taught him trick roping, one taught him how to handle a bull whip, and another taught him how to play the guitar. Trailer recalls, "All those cowboys were good at what they taught me, but after I learned each (skill), I was the only one of the bunch who could do all three!" By age 11, the student had begun performing with his mentors in Texas rodeos. Trailer's grandfather only warned the cowboys that they shouldn't let him ride "rough stock", meaning the broncos and bulls.

As a young man in Texas, Trailer found other opportunities to employ his skills. At age 16 he started his own band, "The Ramblin' Rustlers," which performed locally. "I was always a ham who loved to perform," he said. "I could always play guitar, sing and tell stories." Trailer also began calling square dances.

At 18 years old, Trailer left Texas for the national rodeo circuit. "I traveled the country a little bit," Trailer reminisced. "The audiences got a kick out of a teenager being out there and trick riding and roping and bull whips and singing."

In 1948 Trailer was working in the traveling rodeo when he met Western movie star Gabby Hayes backstage at Madison Square Garden. That meeting would proved to be life-changing. An impressed Hayes hired him to work at his Catskills summer ranch for kids as entertainment director. Rex was the oldest child in a large family, and so was already practiced at engaging the young ones. Hayes, recognizing Trailer's rare natural talent over the course of that summer, encouraged him to break into the fledgling world of children's television as an on-air personality.