By Mike Bowen, co-author, We Found the Lost Sand Creek Site
Butch Kelley, of Lamar, CO, is very instrumental in identifying some of our Sand Creek artifacts—he actually identified the most important artifact we discovered.
Even if you don’t know him, there’s a strong likelihood you’ve seen him on the big screen. He‘s a historian and was a longtime Cavalry War era reenactor—he has been in movies and TV shows, including Back to the Future 3, Son of the Morning Star, Conagher, and Ride With the Devil.
There’s a scene in Back to the Future 3 where Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) outruns charging Indians on horseback in his Deloreon, backing it into a cave. He gets out of the car and gets on top of the cave just as Cavalry soldiers are chasing after the Indians—he jumps into the cave, nearly getting trampled. One of the soldiers was Butch Kelley, who can be seen in the photo below, jump right over Fox. A video of that scene is embedded below the photo. Look at the photo carefully and you may be able to spot Butch in the video.
“This was in Monument Valley, Utah—I was there for 10 days filming one charge scene,” Kelley said. They began their charge about 100 yards from a cave. “When we were charging, my saddle broke, I slid off, and I was hanging upside down underneath this horse’s neck. I didn’t see it cause I was hanging upside down, but they said Michael J. Fox saw me coming right at him and he dove for the cave. My horse stopped after that and the camera crew was just clapping and cheering! I almost killed him,” Butch said.
Kelley used three different horses for the charge scene, including two he owned and a loaner. It’s possible he’s in that scene riding all three horses since multiple takes would be edited into one scene.
In the TV mini-series, Son of the Morning Star, Kelley played a soldier.
“We did a hand-to-hand combat fight scene on Last Stand Hill and I had a fight with an Indian. They were shooting real arrows at us. Real arrows! I called the AD (Assistant Director) and I showed him this arrow and told him they were shooting real arrows. Can we shoot back with live ammo? No, that didn’t go over,” Kelley said. “This Indian came at me and as soon as he came close to me, I hit him with my carbine.”
In another scene from Son of the Morning Star, Kelley portrayed a dead soldier. “They sprayed us with fake blood, and the ants crawled all over us with that.” He was in various scenes throughout the series.
Kelley also provided his talents for the movie, Conagher, starring Sam Elliott. The movie was filmed at Buckskin Joe near Cañon City, CO. “I was in a bar room scene with Sam Elliott; I was having drinks with him and Barry Corbin, sitting around a table telling jokes, and Sam Elliott was just laughing his butt off.”
Other films include Far and Away with Tom Cruise and Ride With the Devil, starring Toby Maguire and Jewel. Kelley took his sons Justin and Shane with him for some of the filming of Far and Away. “Shane got to ride around all morning with Tom Cruise.”
In the movie, Ride With the Devil, he played two different parts.
“I was one of the Confederate bushwhackers—we had to go both ways. We had to be a bushwhacker and then we also had to change clothes, put our uniforms back on, and then we were Union Cavalry chasing them.”
“We chased themselves (ourselves),” Kelley commented.
He also provided horses and equipment for a private film, Through the Gap, starring Martin Kove and Bruce Boxleitner. Kove is best known for his role as John Kreese, the main antagonist who ran the dojo in Karate Kid. He reprised the role in the Netflix series, Kobra Kai.
What do you remember seeing Butch in? Leave us a comment here or on our Facebook post. Make sure to also read about him in our book, We Found the Lost Sand Creek Site.
The post from Butch Kelley should have been from me.