Charlie Battles (March 9, 1945 to April 21, 2013) was a steer wrestling champion, rancher, and rodeo stock contractor from Oklahoma, best known as the first husband of country singer Reba McEntire. The two married in June 1976 and divorced in 1987.
Outside that marriage, Battles served in the US Army in Germany, won International Rodeo Association steer wrestling titles, qualified for the 1974 PRCA National Finals, married Donna Granger in 1998 and died in Sulphur, Louisiana, after a stroke in 2006. Every detail below is checked against his obituary and other published sources, and weak claims are clearly marked.
Charlie Battles Quick Facts
| Detail | Verified information |
| Full name | Charles Warner Battles, known as Charlie |
| Born | March 9, 1945, in Tulsa, Oklahoma |
| Raised | Talala, Oklahoma |
| Parents | Earl Battles and Ocey Battles Pack |
| Military service | US Army, 1962 to 1965, Armor Intelligence Specialist stationed in Germany |
| Profession | Steer wrestler, rancher and rodeo stock contractor |
| Rodeo honors | International Rodeo Association steer wrestling champion in 1968, 1970 and 1971; qualified for the PRCA National Finals in 1974 |
| First marriage | 1966, two sons, later divorced |
| Marriage to Reba McEntire | June 1976 to 1987 |
| Later wife | Donna Granger, married in 1998 |
| Sons | Lance and Coty Battles |
| Health | Major stroke in 2006 |
| Died | April 21, 2013, at age 68, in Sulphur, Louisiana |
| Cause of death | Heart failure and complications from the 2006 stroke |
| Net worth | Not reliably documented |
Who Was Charlie Battles?
Most search results reduce Charlie Battles to one line about his famous ex-wife. His obituary, published by the funeral home that cared for his family, tells a fuller story of a small-town Oklahoma boy who became a soldier, a rodeo champion, a ranch owner and a livestock businessman.
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Early Life and Family Background
Charlie was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on March 9, 1945, the son of Earl Battles and Ocey Battles Pack. He was mainly raised in the small town of Talala by his mother and grandparents, and he attended elementary and high school in Talala and nearby Oologah. His obituary also lists a brother and a sister among his survivors, which shows he stayed connected to his Oklahoma roots for life.
That rural upbringing matters. In northeastern Oklahoma, horses, cattle and rodeo arenas were part of everyday culture, and it explains how a young man with no famous connections ended up competing against some of the toughest cowboys in the country.
Army Service and Return to Oklahoma
Battles joined the US Army in 1962. He completed basic training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, and then spent the last two years and four months of his three-year enlistment in Germany as an Armor Intelligence Specialist. He was honorably discharged on July 7, 1965.
After the Army, he returned to Talala and began entering rodeos across the United States. Many online profiles skip his military service entirely, but it is documented in his obituary and is a useful reminder that his life had a disciplined start long before he met Reba McEntire.
Charlie Battles’ Rodeo Career
Rodeo was the center of Charlie Battles’ working life. From his return to Oklahoma in the mid 1960s until about 1993, he competed in rodeos, and he built a record that earned respect in a sport where results are measured in seconds.
What Makes Steer Wrestling So Demanding
Steer wrestling, also called bulldogging, is a timed rodeo event. The cowboy starts on horseback in a box, and a steer is released with a head start. The rider chases it down, slides off the horse at full speed, grabs the horns and uses leverage and timing to bring the animal to the ground. A second rider called a hazer keeps the steer running straight so the wrestler has a fair chance.
The event rewards strength, but it rewards timing and horse training even more. A split second of hesitation can mean a missed steer, an injury or a no-time score. That is why a steer wrestling champion carries real standing in the rodeo world.
Championships and National Finals Record
According to his obituary, Battles became an International Rodeo Association (IRA) steer wrestling champion in 1968, 1970 and 1971. He also qualified for the PRCA National Finals in 1974, the year-end showcase for the best professional cowboys in the sport.
You may see other championship years on some websites, including 1970, 1972 and 1973. Those dates do not match his obituary, so this article follows the obituary. When a family-prepared record and a scattered set of copied web pages disagree, the first source is the safer one.
Ranching and the Charlie Battles PRCA Rodeo Livestock Company
Rodeo was not Charlie’s only business. After his first marriage ended, he bought a small ranch near Stringtown, Oklahoma, and kept competing until about 1993.
In 1995, after moving to Detroit, Texas, he bought a PRCA rodeo livestock company and renamed it the Charlie Battles PRCA Rodeo Livestock Company. A rodeo stock contractor supplies the animals for events, such as bucking horses, bulls and steers, and a good contractor is judged by how well those animals perform for competitors and audiences. Moving from competitor to contractor is a natural step for a veteran cowboy, because he already knew what makes a rodeo animal fair and exciting.
His ranching life also overlapped with his marriage to Reba McEntire. A long-running CNN profile of Reba notes that for more than ten years the couple split their time between ranching together and pursuing separate careers. After the divorce, Reba moved to Nashville and began building her business ventures, according to the Country Music Hall of Fame.
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Charlie Battles and Reba McEntire: The Marriage Timeline
Dates are where most articles about Charlie Battles go wrong, so here is a single timeline built from his obituary and published biographies of Reba.
| Year | What happened |
| 1945 | Charlie Battles is born in Tulsa on March 9 |
| 1962 to 1965 | Serves in the US Army, with the last years spent in Germany |
| 1966 | Marries for the first time; two sons are born |
| 1968, 1970, 1971 | Wins IRA steer wrestling championships |
| 1974 | Qualifies for the PRCA National Finals; Reba sings the national anthem at the National Finals Rodeo that year |
| June 1976 | Marries Reba McEntire; he is 31 and she is 21 |
| 1976 | Reba begins releasing singles |
| 1984 | Reba wins her first CMA Female Vocalist of the Year award |
| 1986 | Reba joins the Grand Ole Opry |
| 1987 | Reba plays Carnegie Hall; the marriage ends in divorce; The Last One to Know is released on September 7 |
| 1989 | Reba marries Narvel Blackstock |
| About 1993 | Charlie stops competing in rodeo |
| 1995 | Charlie Battles PRCA Rodeo Livestock Company is named |
| 1998 | Charlie marries Donna Granger |
| 2006 | Charlie suffers a major stroke |
| April 21, 2013 | Charlie dies at age 68 |
How Two Rodeo Worlds Met
Reba McEntire was born in McAlester, Oklahoma, on March 28, 1955, and grew up in a ranching and rodeo family. Her father was an Oklahoma steer roper. Charlie spent his life in the same arenas.
Reba’s biography notes that she sang the national anthem at the National Finals Rodeo in 1974, the same year Charlie qualified for the Finals as a competitor. No reliable source confirms that this is where they met, and accounts of their first meeting vary. What is clear is that they shared the same ranch and rodeo background.
The 1976 Wedding
The Country Music Hall of Fame confirms that Reba married a rodeo star ten years her senior in June 1976. Using their verified birth dates, Charlie was 31, and Reba was 21.
Charlie was not marrying for the first time. He had two young sons from his 1966 marriage, which made Reba a stepmother in her early twenties while her own music career was only beginning to take shape.
Divorce in 1987 and What Reba Has Said
The marriage ended in 1987 after about eleven years. The strongest verified facts are limited. In a profile, CNN reported that Reba has said she believes she put her career ahead of the marriage. In a 1987 newspaper interview, given while the divorce was underway, she said Charlie had supported her for many years before that support stopped being his priority.
Beyond that, the public record is thin. Some websites claim Charlie was controlling, jealous or struggled with substance abuse, but those pages do not name a primary source, and this article leaves them out. When a claim about a real person cannot be traced to anything solid, repeating it does the reader no favors.
Reba After the Divorce
After the divorce, Reba moved to Nashville and built her business ventures. She married Narvel Blackstock in 1989. CNN describes him as a former steel guitar player in her band who later became her tour manager, and the Hall of Fame notes that he eventually managed her career until their divorce in 2015.
The album The Last One to Know, released September 7, 1987, is often called Reba’s divorce album, and she has used that description herself. It peaked at number three on the country albums chart, went platinum and produced two number one singles. Still, not every Song is a diary page. One track, “What You Gonna Do About Me,” tells a divorce through a child’s eyes even though Reba and Charlie had no children together. Treat the album as shaped by that period of her life rather than a literal account of it.
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Charlie Battles’ Children and Family
Charlie had two sons, Lance and Coty Battles, from his 1966 marriage. Reba became their stepmother in 1976, and she and Charlie had no children together. Several outlets report that Reba stayed close to the boys after the divorce and that Coty followed his father into steer wrestling before moving into ranching. Both men have kept private lives, so this article does not add personal details about them.
Charlie’s obituary lists a wider family circle as well, including his wife Donna, his brother and sister, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. That detail is worth remembering when you read celebrity headlines, because the family around him was far larger than a single marriage.
Later Life: Marriage to Donna Granger and Health Struggles
Charlie married Donna Granger in 1998 while living in Detroit, Texas. In 2006, he suffered a major stroke that left him totally disabled. Later that same year, he and Donna moved to Sulphur, Louisiana, where she cared for him until his death.
This stretch of his life is the least covered online. It shows a man who spent more than a decade living quietly, with caregiving and family replacing the rodeo arena and the headlines.
When and How Did Charlie Battles Die?
Charlie Battles died on Sunday, April 21, 2013, at age 68. His obituary states the cause as heart failure and complications from the stroke he suffered in 2006. He passed away in Sulphur, Louisiana, where he had lived with his wife Donna for his final years.
A visitation was held on April 25, 2013, and a graveside service followed on April 26 at Mimosa Pines Cemetery North. If you have seen claims that Charlie Battles is still alive or that his whereabouts are unknown, those claims are wrong.
Charlie Battles Net Worth
There is no reliable figure for Charlie Battles’ net worth. No verified financial record, court filing or business disclosure puts a number on his ranch, his livestock company or his estate. A few websites quote an estimate of about three million dollars, but none of them cite a source, so this article does not repeat it.
What can be said is that his income came from rodeo winnings, ranching and a livestock business that he privately owned. Anyone claiming a precise net worth for a private rancher is guessing.
Charlie Battles Myths vs Facts
Because Charlie’s name is searched mostly through Reba McEntire, a lot of low-quality pages copy and distort each other. Here are the most common errors and what the record actually shows.
| Common claim | What the record shows |
| He was born in Okeene, Oklahoma | His obituary says he was born in Tulsa and raised in Talala |
| He remarried in 1992 and had two sons with a second wife | His two sons came from his 1966 marriage; he married Donna Granger in 1998 |
| His IRA titles came in 1970, 1972 and 1973 | His obituary lists 1968, 1970 and 1971 |
| Reba and Charlie had a daughter named Shelby | They had no children together; Shelby is Reba’s son with Narvel Blackstock |
| Charlie was Reba’s steel guitarist or manager | That describes Narvel Blackstock; Charlie was a rodeo competitor and rancher |
| His sons were teenagers when Reba married him | His sons were born after his 1966 marriage, so they were young boys in 1976 |
| His whereabouts are unknown | He died on April 21, 2013 |
Why People Still Search for Charlie Battles
Most searchers fall into a few groups. Reba McEntire fans want to understand her first marriage and how it shaped her early career. Music fans reading about The Last One to Know want to know who the divorce album was about. Rodeo followers and Oklahoma families are curious about a steer wrestler with real titles. And a growing number of readers arrive because they noticed that different websites contradict each other and want one reliable answer.
That last group is the reason this guide leans on his obituary, the Country Music Hall of Fame and archived reporting rather than copied web pages.
Final Thoughts
Charlie Battles deserves to be remembered for more than one famous marriage. He was an Army veteran, a champion steer wrestler, a rancher, a rodeo stock contractor, a father and a husband to Donna Granger in his later years. His marriage to Reba McEntire from 1976 to 1987 is a real chapter in her story, but it is only one chapter in his. When you read about him, check dates against his obituary and be careful with claims that no one will source.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Charlie Battles?
Charlie Battles was an Oklahoma steer wrestler, rancher and rodeo stock contractor, best known as Reba McEntire’s first husband. He was born in 1945 and died in 2013.
Is Charlie Battles still alive?
No. Charlie Battles died on April 21, 2013, at age 68, from heart failure and complications from a stroke he suffered in 2006.
When did Charlie Battles and Reba McEntire get married and divorce?
They married in June 1976 and divorced in 1987, after about eleven years together. Charlie was 31, and Reba was 21 at the wedding.
Did Reba McEntire and Charlie Battles have children?
No. They had no children together. Reba became stepmother to Charlie’s two sons, Lance and Coty, from his earlier marriage. Her only biological child, Shelby, is her son with Narvel Blackstock.
What was Charlie Battles famous for?
He was famous in rodeo circles as an International Rodeo Association steer wrestling champion in 1968, 1970 and 1971, and as a 1974 PRCA National Finals qualifier. To the wider public, he is known for his marriage to Reba McEntire.
How did Charlie Battles die?
He died of heart failure and complications from a major stroke he suffered in 2006, according to his obituary. His wife Donna cared for him in Sulphur, Louisiana, until his death.
Who was Charlie Battles’ wife after Reba?
Charlie married Donna Granger in 1998 while living in Detroit, Texas. She was still his wife when he died in 2013.
What is Charlie Battles’ net worth?
No reliable net worth figure exists. Any specific number you see online is an unsourced estimate.
I’m Elyon Marwood, the voice behind BlessWithUs. Writing has always been more than just words for me; it’s a way to share faith, spread hope, and bring light into someone’s day. Through heartfelt blessings, meaningful prayers, and uplifting messages, I create moments that help you slow down, feel at peace, and reconnect with what truly matters. Every piece I write carries a purpose to comfort your heart, strengthen your faith, and remind you that even in the quietest moments, you are deeply guided, loved, and blessed.
