W. K. Kellogg (of breakfast cereal fame) founded an Arabian breeding farm in California on property adjacent to California Polytechnic University. He eventually donated it to Cal Poly, and Kellogg resources continue to form part of an agriculture-horsemanship program at the university. Seventy-five years ago, the Kellogg Arabian farm put on free Sunday afternoon shows featuring their stallions, but the “shows” were exhibitions of training that went well beyond what we usually see circling the rail today. Here Hanad shows off his talent at jumping rope, an exercise requiring great strength that at the Spanish Riding School (and without the rope) is called “courbette.” Likewise, a purebred Arabian stallion trained in the 1960s by the great Fredy Knie of the eponymous Swiss National Circus Knie is documented making 17 successive courbette jumps, far and away the world’s record!
Left: The traditional California horse was also featured in the Kellogg program. Farana, a handsome and correct stallion foaled in 1929, carried four crosses to Mesaoud.
*Antez, bred in Poland from asil bloodlines and foaled in 1921. A golden chestnut with an iridescent coat, he was a horse of almost incredible athletic ability: He could rack as well as trot, and he was a champion racehorse, placing well even in...
Below: Sharik, a Hanad grandson foaled in 1939, was primarily Polish-bred and, like *Antez, displayed a red-gold coat. Here he performs the Spanish Walk.
*Witez II, foaled in 1938, was imported to the United States in 1945 by the U.S. Army Remount Service for whom he stood at stud until 1948 at the Kellogg-Cal Poly Ranch. When the Remount Service folded, the stallion was purchased by Earl E. and Frances...
This is Hanad, foaled
in 1922, a personal favorite of the author’s. Sired by *Deyr, another of the 1906 Davenport
importations, he was also a grandson of the
war-mare *Wadduda.