RODEOS TO ROCKETS: THE TEXAN WHO TIGHTENED TIES WITH CHINA

US lawyer Charles Foster has spent decades forging relations with national leaders and celebrities

For Charles Foster, the moment when Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping climbed down from a Western stagecoach and put on a 10-gallon Stetson cowboy hat in Simonton, Texas, was thrilling and symbolic.

"I knew then that this was a historic moment, it was so symbolic - China's leader in a Mao suit wearing a Western symbol, smiling at people. At that moment, I knew history was being made," said Foster, who was among the 100 VIPs invited to join Deng at a rodeo in the small town outside Houston in February 1979.