Horse Breeder James Stubbs Loved To Teach, Encourage Youth

It was schoolteacher James Nelson Stubbs who gave prize-winning jockey Bryson Cooper a foothold in the horse-racing profession.

Cooper, a Puyallup resident, first met Mr. Stubbs almost 30 years ago, in the Kent barbershop where Cooper's father worked. Mr. Stubbs, was a customer who invited the then-13-year-old to come out to his Thoroughbred farm in South Prairie, Pierce County.

The visit grew into a weekend job at the farm. A year later, Cooper moved to the farm, spending his high-school years learning about horses from hoof to mane - cleaning the animals, sweeping stalls and riding them.

At 18, when Cooper first rode as a professional jockey, he mounted one of Mr. Stubbs' horses. Mr. Stubbs offered Cooper a leg up.

"We were good friends. It didn't just end with the horses. He included me into his family, he treated me as one of his own," he said. "If it weren't for him, I don't know where I'd be or what I'd be doing right now."

An award-winning horse breeder and longtime educator, Mr. Stubbs, a South Prairie resident since 1960, died May 25. He was 75.

Born in Nyssa, Ore., into a family of educators, Mr. Stubbs was the second of four children. He earned his undergraduate degree from Eastern Washington University in education and his master's from Washington State University, his older brother, Roderick, said.

In 1941, he married his high-school sweetheart, Geraldine, and started on his teaching career in Lind, Adams County.

After a two-year stint in the army, serving in the Philippines from 1944 to 1946, he and his family moved to Steptoe, Whitman County, where he continued teaching. Several years later, they relocated to the Shoreline area, where he taught in the Shoreline School District's junior high and high schools.

He loved teaching and finding different ways to challenge young students, said his oldest son, Michael, of Kent. His love for language and learning was evident in his interest in poetry and even in diagraming sentences, Michael Stubbs said.

His interests ranged from collecting music recordings from the early 20th century to construction. And objecting to stricter rules on how teachers could discipline students, Mr. Stubbs left teaching for several years and started his own construction company, called Crown Homes, Inc.

He earned enough money to buy an 80-acre plot in South Prairie and build his Thoroughbred horse-breeding farm, called Crown Ranch.

There, his long-harbored love for horses flourished, his brother said. He often invited disadvantaged youths to share in that interest, hiring them for odd jobs on the ranch, Roderick Stubbs said.

"I think he had a real sense for the underdog," said Michael Stubbs, adding that he would often take in foster children. "He was willing to put the effort into helping kids out" in teaching and outside of school.

"He had a very active type of life. He did many different things that were quite sensational," Roderick Stubbs said.

But Mr. Stubbs the educator also emphasized the importance of schooling, as Cooper recalled.

"He changed me around. I wasn't doing very good in school, but he made me do my homework. I ended up with a 3.5 grade-point average," Cooper said. "He was always a positive influence."

He would return to teaching for a few years in the 1970s, joining the Enumclaw School District, said his son.

Other survivors include his wife, Geraldine, of South Prairie; a daughter, Jeanne Brown of Hartshorne, Okla.; another son, Pat of South Prairie; and two sisters, Muriel Veal of Montgomery, Ala., and Maureen Phillips of West Palm Beach, Fla. He was preceded in death by a son, Frank.

A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. tomorrow at the Evangel Temple in South Prairie. A reception will follow at the Community Center. Donations may be made to the American Cancer Society.