FRONTIER DAYS A RIDIN', ROPIN' GOOD TIME.

Byline: Amy Dawes Daily News Staff Writer

The cowboy at the pool table created some playful interference as I tried to walk past him. ``What are you doing with a black felt cowboy hat in the summertime?'' he demanded.

``It was a bargain,'' I replied, fingering my first-ever purchase of Western headgear, not at all surprised by his rigorous attention to sartorial matters.

Just an hour or two before, I'd seen a man led to a public scaffold by gunslingers and nearly hanged for wearing paisley shorts, topsider shoes and a T-shirt - standard summer attire in San Diego, where he was from, but not up here in Cheyenne, Wyo., the gateway to the Old West, and certainly not during Frontier Days.

Cheyenne is one of the few places in the Western world where men are willing to suffer for fashion. Ninety-five degrees or not, the pool-playing cowboy and his buddies sported the correct gear - straw cowboy hats, long-sleeved, snap-button Western shirts, Wrangler jeans and dusty 'lacers - the latest popular version of cowboy boots.

But Cheyenne Frontier Days, which takes place this year July 19-28, is about a lot more than suiting up to celebrate Western ways. It's about serious rodeo - the largest outdoor rodeo in the world - held each afternoon for nine days straight in the 17,000-seat arena. Top cowboys and livestock travel here from all over to compete for more than $500,000 in prize money.

As one of the richest rodeos on the annual calendar, Cheyenne can make or break a cowboy's year, vaulting him into the finals or sending him away broken, bruised and poorer than he came.

This year, it celebrates its 100th anniversary, with not only cowboys from all over but with the cream of country music artists, among them Garth Brooks, Wynonna, Vince Gill, George Strait, Alabama, Brooks & Dunn, Randy Travis, Marck Chesnutt and Kathy Mattea.

Yet for all the rodeo and music excitement it offers, Cheyenne also has something many other cities don't - an abundance of atmosphere and small-town charm. In a town of 50,000, where a corps of 2,000-plus volunteers makes the rodeo possible every year, there arises a sense of common cause that allows you, during the short time you're here, to forget that the rest of the world exists.

One example is the free pancake breakfast held downtown three times during rodeo week. Between 8,000 and 10,000 people show up and the line moves quickly. Cowboy-hatted cooks send flapjacks spiraling through the air, to be caught on foil-covered trays by Cub Scouts in uniform.

``People can't figure out why they don't have to pay,'' said Chuck Fontanella, a member of the Cheyenne Kiwanis Club. He posed for a picture in front of the cement-mixer truck that was churning the pancake batter. Fontanella retired here 20 years ago after he served out his stint at the local Air Force base. ``My wife and I weren't going back to New York City,'' he said. ``There, it's `What can I do to you?' Here, it's `What can I do for you? Quite a difference in prepositions.''

There's plenty to do and see during rodeo week, including a huge carnival midway adjacent to the rodeo grounds that opens at 11 each morning and runs until midnight. In addition to rides, games and nonstop free entertainment, there are acres of vendors selling Western crafts and gear.

Across the fairgrounds, there's an Old West museum and an American Indian village, in which dancers from the Southern Plains tribes perform at least three times daily.

Of course, Cheyenne means partying to a lot of people - we ran into them at places like the fabled Hitching Post bar and the always rowdy Wigwam Lounge, next to the Plains Hotel downtown.

Our favorite was Jack and Gloria Horn's Cowboy Bar out on Greeley Highway, an always lively playground distinguished by the oil derrick that looms above it and the rodeo murals on its outer walls. The bar is long, the dance floor roomy. But the big place fills up fast, and if you get tired of bumping hat brims with other Western types, you can retreat to the parking lot, where there's just as much going on.

Wyoming law permits serving liquor outdoors, and owner Jack Horn, who runs the place with bartender Gloria, his wife of 40 years, does a brisk business outside on draft beer, tequila shots, grilled hamburgers and barbecue sandwiches.

The party scene goes late, since a lot of people don't arrive until after the country music shows in the rodeo arena. If you're any kind of country music fan, you'll probably agree that there's no better place to see a concert than outdoors under a gorgeous Western evening sky, with the dust of a rodeo arena beneath your feet.

Next morning, you can catch the Old West parade that winds through downtown four times during the rodeo week (best viewing spot is at 18th and Carey streets, at Key Bank, where there's a grandstand and a parade announcer) or the early rodeo events, which begin at 7 a.m. and include barrel racing (the sole women's event) and steer wrestling.

Later, you can stroll through old downtown Cheyenne, where practically everything you'll want to do is clustered in about six blocks. Across the street from where the pancake breakfasts are held is Gunslinger's Square, where gunfights and other good-natured tomfoolery are enacted several times a day, including the near-hanging I had witnessed of the San Diego man in the paisley shorts.

About that unofficial dress code - it's encouraged, particularly for men, but not enforced. Tourists tend to start resembling locals after a short while, since shopping for Western duds is a pleasure in Cheyenne's many well-stocked outlets. Two of the most popular are right downtown - Cheyenne Outfitters, at 210 W. 16th St., and across the street, the Wrangler, which is larger and more bargain-oriented.

Above all else, there's the rodeo, which kicks off shortly after 1 p.m. each afternoon at the fairgrounds and runs until nearly 4:30. With more than 1,200 contestants in town for last summer's event, there were plenty of real rodeo cowboys to talk to, including Caine Hager, 21, of Garland, Texas, who works as a ``bullfighter'' and said he plans to make a lifetime career of it.

Bullfighters are the guys in clown makeup and baggy pants who distract the angry bull after a cowboy gets dumped in the dirt.

Hager said he deals with his fear by confronting it. ``Once you take a hooking, you won't be scared again,'' he declared in his Western twang. ``I'd take a hooking for any cowboy. That's my job.''

To `take a hooking,'' in rodeo slang, means to be gored by the horn of a raging bovine in your ribs or backside.

``He saved me lots of times,'' vouched Hager's traveling partner, Matt Keith, a bareback rider from Montana who said he used to ride bulls ``until I watched a good friend of mine get hurt.''

Much of the prize money in professional rodeo comes from the cowboys themselves, who pony up entry fees of about $250 to enter each event. They can walk away with 10 times that amount for eight seconds work on a high-scoring ride, or more commonly, go empty-handed if they're bucked off before the buzzer sounds or commit some other infraction of the style rules.

I'd read somewhere that the chutes open every 18 seconds at the Cheyenne rodeo - a level of excitement that seems pretty close to the truth. The action moved briskly in the bull riding, bareback and saddle bronc contests, intercut with steer wrestling and roping, both astoundingly athletic events that are best appreciated in the long arena at Cheyenne, where speeds reach at least 30 mph before cowboys jump from their running horses to bring down the steers, either with a rope or with muscle, depending on the event.

The highlight of last summer's rodeo was the performance of bull rider Tuff Hedeman of Bowie, Texas, then a three-time world champion (he went on to win the title again in 1995). Hedeman had broken his back during the National Finals two years before, and seen his best friend, bull rider Lane Frost, gored to death at Cheyenne in 1989. Doctors had said Hedeman wouldn't ride again, but there he was, high in the standings. And on the final Sunday in Cheyenne, he rode a hurricane of a snot-slinging Brahma around until the buzzer sounded and he jumped off with an 82 score.

Hedeman accepted his trophy belt buckle and posed for pictures between two smiling rodeo queens, dedicating his win to Frost, to whom a statue has been erected in front of the Old West museum. And as the rodeo crowd began to edge for the exits, the skies opened and the rains came bucketing down for the first time all week.

My friend and I left Cheyenne shortly afterward, and our total immersion Western experience had vanished behind us. I yearned for the vivid sights and sounds of a people tied up with land, livestock and thrilling sport - but there was no turning back - at least not until July rolled around again.

On Location The Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo runs the last full week of July every year. For 1997, rodeo dates are July 19-28. Tickets usually go on sale during the second week of December for the following year's events.

Cheyenne is a welcoming place, but visitors still should be wary of unregulated prices at local hotels, which more than double their rates during Frontier Days. A friend and I, after booking six months in advance at a motel listed on the rodeo committee's brochure, lost a $200 deposit when the shabby room proved uninhabitable.

We heard a story of someone else losing nearly twice that amount at another fleabag. The best policy is to go with a chain, unless you can get a recommendation from someone who knows what's what, and to book as early as possible.

Outside Cheyenne, accommodations are available in the neighboring towns of Laramie, Wyo., Scotts Bluff, Neb., Greeley, Colo., and Fort Collins, Colo., each about a 45-minute drive from Cheyenne.

Ticket sales and information: [phone]. General rodeo information: [phone]. Area and hotel information: Cheyenne Visitors Bureau, [phone].

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos, Box

Photo: (1) J. Paul Williams of Ponca City, Okla., c hases after a steer during last year's rodeo.

(2) Billy Laye of Beshaw, Alberta, Canada, hangs on to a bronc's bare back.

Michelle Bridwell

Box: On Location (See text)