“SPORTHORSE” PERFORMERS

SADDLEBRED

OF A CENTURY AGO

Here are Tom Bass’ three champion High School horses. We see Miss Rex in collected trot and the other two horses in passage, all correctly collected, deeply engaged, and very expressive in their movement. Miss Rex is by Rex Denmark and thus a descendant of Queen. She also presents three crosses to Black Hawk 1833, one to Blackburn’s Whip, and one to the very valuable Arabian import *Stamboul. Belle Beach traces in sireline to Black Squirrel and has four close-up crosses to Queen plus one to Black Hawk. Columbus’ parentage has never been ascertained, but an educated guess makes him a grandson of *Stamboul out of a Black Squirrel mare.

Multi-champion Princess Eugenia, acknowledged by the Saddlebred Association as a “BHF” (Broodmare Hall of Fame). Ridden here by Tom Bass protégé John Hook, she goes forward in a lively and expressive passage that differs in no essential point from the style we currently see winning in international dressage competition. The difference with Saddlebreds, though, is that many of them offer this almost spontaneously after only a little training in correct basics (for example, review the story of Capt. William Heyer and Starless Night in “Stars of Stage and Screen,” EQUUS 513). Note the mare’s high, strong back. Princess Eugenia is by Chester Peavine and so we will see her also in our next installment, where we feature horses of the Rex McDonald-Rex Peavine family. She’s included here because she is by Chester Peavine and out of Queen of Lincoln by Wood’s Eagle Bird, a descendant of King William, whose dam was Queen.

The very beautiful Montgomery Chief

1897 piaffing in-hand for one of the Ball Brothers at their stables in Mexico, Missouri. Montgomery Chief is by Bourbon Chief and out of Annie C.