Raised on the Reverse G Cross Ranch 7 miles east of LaGrange, Wyoming, Afton Delano Green, Jr. (most know him as “Babe”) was a true Wyoming cowboy indeed. In the spring of 1883, Babe’s grandparents, Milton & Louisa loaded their covered wagon and started west. They arrived in Wyoming territory in May 1887, where Babe’s father, Afton Delano Green, Sr., was born, the 10th out of 13 children. After seeking employment with other ranches, Afton Sr made his way back to the ranch in January 1926, with his wife, Nellie Cooper, where they raised their children. Babe, the youngest of the three children, was born in 1930. In 1946, besides the herd of Hereford cattle that Babe’s father had built up, Afton Sr. also loved good horses and purchased and brought to the ranch the first of many Registered Quarter Horses to be pastured there.
Babe grew up learning the ways of ranching, working the cattle and all aspects of the horse industry while attending school and graduating from LaGrange High School. He married Marilyn Wiley and worked away from home for several years as a ranch hand. When he returned to the ranch in 1956, he brought with him the beginning of the “Tippy” and the “Wimpy” line of Registered Quarter Horses. Babe had some of the finest cattle cutting horses in the region, most he broke and trained himself in his younger years.
Babe not only raised horses and cattle, but he enjoyed judging high school and amateur rodeos in Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska, and even judged the National High School Rodeo in Harrison, Nebraska. He also judged horse shows throughout the years and worked with his daughters as they showed horses in 4-H. Babe contributed to and enjoyed these aspects of the cowboy life for a half a century.
Babe was known as the “town Veterinarian.” Without any formal training but being quite gifted, he doctored horses, cattle, and even dogs and cats for many in the LaGrange area throughout the years.
In the arena of the Wyoming Cowboy, Afton “Babe” D. Green, Jr clearly left a legacy. He impacted people across the state and beyond coming from true homesteading cowboy “stock.”