25 Years Ago
Late Summer/Early Autumn 1979
by Maurice Telleen
published in The Draft Horse Journal, Autumn 2004

The “Duke” John Wayne, proved to be mortal after all. He died of cancer at the age of 72. He had literally ridden to fame, at least a good part of the time, on the back of a horse or two in countless western movies. He provided a standard for all who chose to be strong, silent, and right–most of the time. He was an O.K. guy, born here in Iowa, and probably not as one dimensional as some of his early films made him out to be. He was, after all, playing roles and he was very good at what he did.

He was even kind of complicated. Like, for instance, he invested millions of dollars of his own money in the filming of “The Alamo,” in which the Mexicans are all scoundrels and the Americans are all fine upright fellows. But when it came to choosing a wife that sort of us/them, right/wrong, good/bad thinking went right out the window. He chose a Hispanic for his wife-all three times.

Since we are south of the border, we may as well camp out for a bit. In July of ‘79, the Somoza family that had ruled and milked Nicaragua for 46 years acknowledged defeat by an odd combination of the Sandinista rebels and some disgusted business types. The country has been devastated by this strife. The big question was whether this unnatural coalition could stand to breathe the same air long enough to even take out the garbage. As for our acting as an honest broker and seeing if it could work, that was out of the question. That was a pipe dream in those black and white days. As for General Somoza, guess where he went-or came. To our house, naturally. He was accustomed to fine living and we were accustomed to looking out for him.

Jimmy Carter’s presidency was not going well. The OPEC nations were putting it to us on oil prices with a 50% hike in the previous year. Carter’s response was to reshuffle some chairs in his cabinet and to make an earnest summons to suck it up, conserve, car pool, cut our imports so as to save 4.5 billion gallons (or barrels, I forget which) of imported oil in the next decade-etc., etc. This was not what the public wanted to hear. They simply wanted cheap gas-not a Protestant Reformation type sermon on the value of and necessity for conservation, frugality, etc. So, that is where it stuck. And, what do you know, here we are again-only more-so-because a lot of those reserves of 1979 have been burned.

We have a Chrysler minivan in our garage. It is, I believe, the third one in a row. It has a lot of cargo room for books and magazines, guests, and gets about 23-24 mpg on the road. It has sliding doors in the back which makes for easy entrance for old people, which describes a good many of our travel companions. It is a bit more than we need nowadays, but was just what the doctor ordered three cars ago. They have all been forest green.

I don’t necessarily think Chryslers are any better than other brands, but if there is another car in our future, I think it, too, will be a Chrysler. I have absolutely no loyalty to any automobile company, but there are sound reasons for repetition. One, their garage and dealership are within two blocks of the DHJ office. Two, they do not tend to move things around on the instrument panel so you don’t have to spend a lot of time looking for how to turn on the lights, or dim them, or lock the doors, or where to honk the horn just before some old person backs into you.

This loyalty is not irrational-nor is it really loyalty. It may be hereditary. My father felt the same way about Oldsmobiles and Jeannine’s did about Fords. Anyhow, I think maybe we will trade cars before the snow flies. The reason I think so is Jeannine is going around saying things like, “I like that shade of red, don’t you?” And she is not pointing at a rose when she says it.

Chrysler, by the way, was a basket case 25 years ago. They had just lost $207 MILLION dollars in the last quarter and they were out of cash reserves.John Riccardo, the chairman of the board, calmly asked the United States Congress for one billion dollars over the course of the next 18 months to keep the company going. What was at stake was 250,000 jobs. I guess the government said, “Okey-dokey, but do try to do better next time” or words to that effect. The company had just brought Lee Iacocca on board from Ford. He was expected to work miracles and he must have because Chrysler is still around-in both red and green, I understand.

The Ayatollah Khomeini, another ‘holy man’ type, who had taken over the reins of government in Iran, had discovered that not everyone shared his zeal for executions. Nor was everyone wild about his idea to close down any newspaper that didn’t genuflect to him. So he said he would keep the real bad guys in the jailhouse and try them, but he would release 3,000 political-type prisoners out of jail just to prove what a good fellow he really was. We weren’t done with him by any means.

Our friends to the north lost a colorful and combative political figure in the sudden death of former Canadian Prime Minister John G. Diefenbaker. He was 83 and had not been ill. He had just been reelected to the House of Commons for the 13th time some three months before he died and was planning a trip to China so he must have been feeling pretty prime.

By September 23 (about the time this issue arrives) it is brisk enough to be thinking about football instead of baseball. About all that is left is the World Series by then. Unless, of course, you are a complete baseball nut like Miles McCarry down in Florida. People like that carry a load of obscure dates and endless statistics in their heads. Because 25 years ago Mac knew that Lou Brock, playing for the St. Louis Cardinals, had tied the 937 stolen bases record achieved by Billy Hamilton in his career from 1888 through 1901. He also knew that two years prior to this that Brock had broken Ty Cobb’s base stealing record of 892 stolen bases.

So Mac was very nervous when the leaves began to turn 25 years ago for he knew that Brock and Hamilton were deadlocked at 937. He need not have worried. On September 23, Brock, playing his last game in New York, drew a walk in the 5th, and then stole a base and the record was his. This made Mac very happy. Also happy was August Busch, Jr., in St. Louis, because among his possessions were both horses and baseball players. The horses were Clydesdales and the baseball players were Cardinals.

Our cover photo was the first from the Maritime Provinces of eastern Canada. It was submitted by Terry Todd of Barss Corner, Nova Scotia. The bay team, then 12 & 13 years old, weighed about 3,100 lbs. They both came from mares on the urine line in Quebec and were sired by a Belgian stallion.

They belonged to brothers Stanley and Clinton Haines, also of Barss Corner. Stanley broke them as yearlings and put them together when they were two and three. The brothers operated a mixed livestock farm along with a good stand of Christmas trees. This pair was the standby work team on that farm.

Clinton was the local area horseshoer and Stanley was the local harness maker. The brothers also did a bit of trading in oxen teams.

In closing, Mr. Todd-the photographer-had this to say of the Haines. “They are good men, good with their hands and good with animals. They favor, as do most men in the area, a smaller horse than is usually seen in the shows. The reason has, of course, to do with economy and soundness and longevity and lots of the other things worth thinking about.”

In the Spring (1979) issue, we ran a picture of Progress, the foundation herd sire at Meadow Brook. We stated that he was sired by Douglas, and out of a mare named Queen Naomi, and we didn’t know anything about either one.

Thanks to Mrs. Charles Munson, Craigville, Indiana, we know a little more, and she sends along this old snapshot of Douglas. Her father, the late David D. Habegger, of near Decatur, Indiana, purchased Douglas as a young horse in the the late ‘20s from Cliff Steiner, Berne, Indiana. Mr. Habegger owned him until the stallion died in 1941. Mr. Habegger was well known for his fine horses in that part of Indiana and Douglas sired many fine colts while under his ownership.

Mrs. Munson states that Queen Naomi at that time belonged to William Mitchell, a neighbor, and that her father was also very proud of Douglas.

So now you students of Belgian pedigrees can have a look at the sire of Progress–a roan, if you please.

Our required-by-law publication of the annual statement of ownership, management and circulation tells me our press runs were between 19,000 and 20,000 copies and our paid circulation was about 18,500. So we must have been figuring that we would need a thousand or more to peddle as single issues or back issues. Had I been asked, cold turkey, about circulation 25 years ago, I wouldn’t have had a clue-anywhere between 12,000 and 20,000 would have sounded reasonable.

Our opening feature article in that issue was about the production of burley tobacco in southwest Virginia. Good work for horses, not bad money for farmers, and there was little or no stigma about raising or using the stuff. Nobody was going around saying it was good for you, but there were very few “No Smoking” signs up either, so it was obviously enjoyed by some and tolerated by others. Our own family doctor smoked as much as I did, but we didn’t bum off of each other. Bye and bye we both quit, and I suppose felt quite virtuous about it.

The Kentucky horsemen (and women) held an organizational meeting of the the newly minted Kentucky Draft Horse Association complete with a speech by one of their own, a native son named Wendell Berry. He made a right good speech so we published it in that issue. It really is fairly pleasant work most of the time. It puts things on the record that would, in most cases, be plumb lost as the spoken word. This enables you to feel a little bit like a monk-preserving “the record.”

Draft horse education was making a serious comeback. The North Adams (Massachusetts) State College was advertising its 9th annual four day workshop with Ken Demers doing the instructing as advertised. It was a true pioneer. Now look at all the hands on, short courses being offered. Once more, enough to make any monk happy.

Our next article was by John Hahn, an excellent horseman from western Nebraska. He and Bonnie wrote a little book about that time. It was a huge surprise and a real pleasure to see both of them and their son and grandson at the recent Horse Progress Days in Indiana. Talk about “blood telling”-those three generations sure do look alike!

By 1979 many of the concerns of the future of the draft horse, as expressed in the 50 Years Ago column (1954) had been laid to rest. The shows and sales were both far more numerous and were stout. Demand at the fall sales was excellent, particularly for mares-a fact that probably spelled trouble for the future, but the feeling was “let the good times roll.”

Mr. Robert Meyers, Chilhowie, Virginia, with his main work team that was pictured in an article written by James W. Fraley in that Autumn 1979 issue. Mr. Meyers operated a small diversified farm growing corn, small grain, tobacco and cattle. Tobacco was the cash money crop…the rest being used for livestock feed. Mr. Meyers did it all with horses. These mares were full sisters. Excellent workers. There are no pedigrees on Mr. Meyers’ horses…but a lot of performance.

This photo of seven big mules for sale appeared in an ad from Grover Greer and Billy Drake of Kentucky. It was one of the sharpest pictures in that issue.

Five Champion Stallions from 1979
Cash Koncarlaet, 1st prize yearling, Junior and Grand Champion Percheron stallion at the National Show (Ohio) and 2nd at Wisconsin for Art Bast & Family, Hartford, Wisconsin.	House’s Ted Farceur, Sr. and Grand Champion Belgian stallion at the Minnesota and Wisconsin State Fairs, Supreme Champion Draft Stallion at Waterloo, exhibited by Malvin House & Family, Menomonie, Wisconsin.	Orndorff’s Jim’ Roscoe, Sr. and Grand Champion Belgian Stallion at the National Belgian Show and Indiana State Fair, Res. Sr. and Res. Grand at Illinois for Lee Eller & Family, Arcadia, Indiana.
Marquette’s Dagger, Sr. and Grand Champion Belgian stallion at the Ohio State Fair; Res. Sr. and Res. Grand at Wisconsin, Waterloo and the National Belgian Show in Davenport for Harold McMain and Sons, Delmar, Iowa.	Greendykes’s Excelsior Again, Sr. and Grand Champion stallion and Best of Breed at the 1979 National Clydesdale Show at the Wisconsin State Fair. Exhibited by Paul Cooper, Mukwonago, Wisconsin.