About Our Ministry

How We Started

Allen Bach, 4X World Champion team roper and founder of Smarty Roping, along with his wife, Peggy Ruth, established Forever Cowboy's Ministry in 2006. Their hearts were to encourage and challenge others to trust Jesus in all aspects of life. Allen's favorite verse, Proverbs 3:5-6, provides the foundation that started the ministry and continues to be a truth for Forever Cowboys today.

Who We Are

Forever Cowboys is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization focused on maximizing the Cowboys' influence to impact the world by launching new initiatives focused on the future of our nation. Our vision is to help others build a relationship with Jesus in our Cowboy Community and beyond. We do this by hosting camps to bring up young rodeo pros and teach them the basics of roping while learning the gospel. We also host several events to raise awareness about our nations broken foster care system and its connection to human trafficking. Did you know that over 60% of trafficked victims come out of the foster system. We have decided to stand up and speak out to promote and protect the future of our cowboy heritage and our nation. So we utilize the influence of the cowboys and our culture to stop human trafficking and support children that are aging out of foster care so we can reduce this number to 0%.

How We Make A Difference

Our main programs are: Forever Cowboy Camps, Build Safe Houses, Sponsor a Camper, Sponsor the Young Pro Journalist team, Cowboy Christmas, the Longest Runway, and Legacy of the West Gala, which brings fans and athletes of the sport together to celebrate the legacy of the rodeo community and build awareness for the survivors of trafficking and sexual exploitation and get them the help they need to receive safe housing, counseling, and life and work skills development.

April (Bach) Patterson

April is the oldest of four Bach children. At a young age, she wanted to make an impact on the world. She wanted to do something that let people know they were loved and priceless. Because of her upbringing in the cowboy life and rodeo industry, the cowboy code that includes values like hard work, God fearing, appreciating our nation’s military, family focused…it rubbed off on her. Along with that came the lessons she learned from her Hall of Fame and World Champion father, who has been married for over 35 years to his wife and partner, and demonstrates what love, loyalty and determination looks like. With those standards set before her she has worked in different leadership positions like: Children's Director and graphic designer in Vail, Colorado to working booths at the NFR in Vegas for over 10 years; which included helping with creative direction of the brands. Fast forward to now, she is a wife, mother of three, runs her own magazine and media company called Rodeo Fame and is Executive Director or Forever Cowboys. With most of her relationship building being in the cowboy industry, she decided in 2013 that she wanted to live her life helping to stop human trafficking by raising awareness in the cowboy world and connecting people outside her industry to collaborate on efforts that make the biggest impact. Right now she is focusing on growing her media company and nonprofit to create content that fuels the mission; to help stop human trafficking. The root cause, she believes is, the lack of taking care of our nations orphans. "We want to build safe houses all over the United States on ranches. By connecting cowboy churches, ranchers, rotary clubs and rodeo family, we can make a huge difference." ~ April Patterson