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Enloe Quarter Horses History Part I - How it
all Started...
by Kris Enloe
My love for animals started when I was just a toddler. My parents raised cocker spaniel dogs when I was real young and my grandparents next door had a large dairy farm. We lived about 10 miles from the nearest town, so when we weren't working around the farm doing fun things like picking rock and baling hay, we needed to create our own entertainment. It started with a "rabbit business" and grew to goats, sheep, chickens, you name it, we had it. That's the beauty of growing up on a farm...
Although we did receive a small monthly allowance for working on the farm, my financial luck changed when my grandparents calved a set of twin heifers. Grandma named the calves "Sugar Plum" and "Blossom". The twins were tiny and required extra attention. She gave Sugar to my older brother, and I was given Blossom. The only requirement was that we needed to take care of them. They started out so small, but grew just like the rest of the herd. Soon they were having calves of their own. I was able to sell a bull calf from Blossom and with that money, make my first horse purchase in 1979. A 15.2 hand palomino grade quarter/saddlebred cross mare named "Trixie". She came off a kid's camp because her mild manner often left her short on groceries in the camp's large herd. What a blessing she was!
Trixie was a been there/done that 10 year old when she came into our lives. She was the prefect horse for a kid. She had her quirks, like all horses do, but she was kind through and through. I can remember one, maybe two times she ever shyed in all the miles I put on her. She never reared and I don't think she knew how to buck. That was very important, because my mother grew up in the city and my dad was not thrilled about horses at all. Neither really had any experience with them and I am quite sure they had no idea what they were getting into. I put thousands of miles on that horse. Each day I would ride her to and from the farm a mile away to do chores. We had a well beaten path between our house and the farm.
Because my parents weren't into the "horse thing", I spent most of my time riding by myself unless I was able to have friends over. My older brother's first experience with horses was him on Trixie and me leading him under a tree branch. I had just gotten her and didn't realize she wasn't the same height I was. The horse ducked, but he didn't and he fell off her. After that, he opted to get a three-wheeler. I did have a few horsey friends that were 4-5 miles away, and did get to ride with them in the summer, but it was a cold ride in the winter! I remember piling 3-4 small neighbor kids on her and she didn't care. I would ride her down to the Long Prairie River and Lake Osakis during the summer months and we would use her as a diving board. She loved the water, the attention, just whatever we were doing, she was always game. I even got her stuck once in drifting snow when the main roads were closed and we needed to get down to the farm. It is not an easy thing digging a horse out of snow, let me tell you. Especially when there was no shovel to dig, just hands.
| Trixie Circa 1980 | Trixie, Kris and friend Amy circa 1983 | Kris and Mandikan, aka "Mandy" circa 1983 | Kris and Blossom, 1988 |
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In the early 1980's, I joined the Trailblazers Saddle Club. They met about 6 miles from my house and a kind saddle club member offered to trailer Trixie to the shows for me. My parents were always busy and never did attend a show, so I became the adopted horse crazy kid of the club. It was a good thing too. I was able to learn a lot from families with generations of involvement in horses. It was moving to see people that truly loved horses, and eye opening to see those that treated them unkind. There was a lot of exposure to quarter horses and pedigrees. I also first heard of Pretty Buck through a saddle club member who owned a son of his - a gorgeous dun built like a mack truck and as kind as Trixie. First impressions stick, and since then, I have always had an eye those for Pretty Buck horses.
I won a lot of ribbons with Trixie. Not because she was fast or furious, but because she was old reliable. She may not have been lightning on hooves, but she always made the turn, never rolled a barrel. Strangely, one of the things about my first show I remember is looking around and wanting a "red" horse like everyone else. Here I sat on top of this wonderful big gold horse thinking she would be perfect if only she was red. I didn't have a clue how lucky I was...
As most kids do, I decided I needed an "upgrade" of speed for poles and barrels at the shows. Trixie wasn't going anywhere, I just wanted another horse. We discovered Mandy from a local horse trader. She was supposed to be well broke, but really wasn't. She bucked, bit, kicked, reared, you name it. And I loved her. We always joked that it was like a fair ride when you got on her. You never knew if it was going to be a rollercoaster or the scrambler, but it was always exciting. When she was having a "good hair day", she couldn't be beat. When she wasn't, well, let's just say we over-ran quite a few barrels. Where Trixie was my Sunday cruise, Mandy became the little sports car. Mandy wasn't the type of horse to go out and trail ride by yourself. She always wanted to trot. It took a good half hour to settle her down each ride out. She was a quarter/arab/morgan cross that had the worst and best of all three breeds. She only stood 14.1 or 14.2.
Mandy also gave me a way to have friends come over to ride without having to ride double. There were a few times out on the trails when friends riding Trixie would see a riderless Mandy go flying by them. She always ran home, which was a good thing. Although sometimes it was a long walk home for the ones that got dumped! When I was 16, the end for Mandy and me came when she kicked my dad after he slapped her rump trying to get her to load for a show. My dad made me sell her, and I was back down to just Trixie.
The Trixie era came to an end just a few years later. When I was away at college during my second year, I got a call from my mom saying she had sold Trixie. I was devastated and I don't think I am over it yet nearly 20 years later. I wasn't asked, she was my horse. My mom's reasoning was that I wasn't there to feed her or take care of her and she found a nice home to love her. Three years later my mom was diagnosed with a brain disease that caused her to think incorrectly. Looking back, I hope that is why she chose to sell my first horse. Losing your childhood best friend isn't easy. I didn't know where she was sold to, and never did find out. I am sure she is long gone by now, but I still think about her often. She is the reason I loved horses all those years ago, and still love horses today. When I look at horse temperaments, I always compare them back to Trixie.
Doug's story isn't that long, as he was a city boy. His interest in horses started about the same time as mine, out in Bowman, North Dakota. His dad's family ran a small working cattle ranch. They didn't have any horses, but the neighbors did. Doug actually grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, but when they were out working on the farm, "the city kids" were allowed to borrow Chuka, a ranch gelding that wasn't quite kid broke, but was gentle. He didn't have a real good stop on him and gave an occasional buck, andDoug actually became a very balanced rider because of it.
One of the first things we did after graduating from college was get a horse. We were getting married, and we hadn't even closed on our farm yet, but we had a horse purchase in the works! This one was our first registered quarter horse...Part II coming soon!