What is a Lippitt Morgan Horse?

A weekend of memories, reunion, celebration and horses, weekends don't get much better than that.

I was at the Lippitt Country Show in Tunbridge, Vt. After the quiet peaceful drive over roads I have not travelled in many years I passed familiar scenes, a dairy with its own covered bridge and the place where the road seems carved into the side of the mountain and the valley opened, I had arrived. The sounds of a horse show are the same everywhere but the horses have a great variety, except at this show. Here the horses were cookie cutter similar. A few variations in color but all of the classic bay, brown, black and chestnut. What was most predominant in the landscape of equine bodies was the gentle eye and the indomitable spirit. These are the descendants of great horses, a bloodline well preserved and lauded by its keepers, The Lippitt Club. www.lippittclub.net The Lippitt Club motto is "Preserving Our Morgan Legacy", and truly these horses look just as their ancestors did 200 years ago. A line from the Lippitt Club brochure states; " ...a strain of Morgan that has no 20th century outcrosses to other breeds, resulting in the highest percentage of Morgan blood available today."


This mare in the picture is a Lippitt Morgan I foaled out in 1992. She was my baby and a beauty, with spirit and talent and a structure about as well balanced and correct as they come in equines. Her name is Storybook Salute Vermont ( in honor of her Dad, Horton's Vermont, her heritage and my favorite C.W. Anderson book "Salute"!) . The last time I saw her was in 1997, when I sent her along into the world to become a young ladies show horse and she has had a well decorated career. Now with a new family and back in Connecticut I still didn't manage to see her until I reached the show grounds in Vermont. She entered the ring with her young handler for a clinic in showanship. It was warm and sunny and they had been on a long trailer ride up from home. All the horses were in nap mode but I let out the whistle I always called my horses with and her head popped up in recognition. She was searching the memory bank for that sound was so distant but familiar. Her ears pricked forward and I asked the young lady to bring her to the fence. I rubbed her face and renewed an old friendship, and I know she remembered me. I thought back to the moment when her body burst into the world wet and shiny and as orange as a Halloween pumpkin. She was not the black or brown I had expected but was gorgeous, as she matured the color toned down to the liver chestnut.


Here we were on a track where the original Morgans raced and where the Morgan breed made a name for itself through its power and strength, versatility and beauty. ( grounds of the Tunbridge World's Fair) The Lippitt Show highlights all those qualities so sought after in the classic Morgans of yesteryear and the ribbons were awarded in breeding stock classes and in many disciplines, to include the regular show classes and add in log skidding, trotting races in harness and under saddle, driving and children's classes. It was a weekend to celebrate Morgans.

Morgan's are memorialized in a Disney movie "Justin Morgan Had a Horse", which in the classic Disney manner tells a tale of the start of the breed through the single stallion "Figure" who later took on his owners name. By 1861 and the outbreak of the Civil War, Vermont and the other northeast states had a generous population of Morgan horses. So generous indeed that the First Vermont Cavalry rode off to battle mounted only on the backs of Morgans! The Morgan Horse became the chosen U.S. cavalry breed with their remount breeding program located in Vermont.

Wherever they are in the country the Lippitt Morgan has its roots in the mountains of Vermont and in the traditions of the U.S. Cavalry. They are the Pride and Product of America!

Dear God, Let It Be A Horse! pt.3

Dear God, Let that sound of a snapping twig be from our horse Daybreak not a BEAR! The night is so dark I turn the little squeeze light in the direction of the sound, nothing. I walk more, "Daybreak", I call out softly, hoping if it's a bear he doesn't like voices and will leave. I see a house off over the treeline and barb wire topped wall that surrounds the fields. Do they hear us out in the night and wonder who is creeping through the field. The lights don't change within the house only a single front light glows a pin point in the distance. In there they can sleep, in dry warm beds, Daybreak where are you fella?" That is when I see him in the bitty ray of light, he nods some form of polite recognition. I run the beam up and down his body he looks fine and my heart floods with relief. "Tim!" I call out into the night but the field so large my voice trails off in the immense wet space and there is no response. " I got him!" , maybe it was for me but I shout the declaration out hoping it would drift to his ears. I walk to Daybreak and extend my arm to take his halter, Tim has the lead rope. My fingers come within and inch of the leather and the head swerves up and away playfully. Ugh! " Daybreak, come on it's late, we'll go back to he farm come on. " He dances away a bit, it's game time.

Daybreak is a Morgan, descended from the Government breeding program for cavalry replacements, he is a thinking horse. He is thinking, let's make a fool of Mom and have some fun. It is a sorry thing, that as my feet squish and my tired body robbed of sleep stumbles in the wet grass, BUT I AM NOT IN THE MOOD FOR GAMES! Daybreak is, he lets me sidle up a couple times and nearly grasp the halter only to lift the head out of reach or turn enough to evade capture. How can one shift from desperately loving a creature to this moment of hate in a split second. OK ,so I don't hate the horse just 2 a.m. games of tag in the northern woods with no sleep and WET feet. In frustration I stuff my hands in pockets and feign disinterest this is a ploy that often works. What my hand falls on in the hay chaff filled pocket is a peppermint wrapper.

This might just be what it feels like to win the lottery. Pure joy, ecstatic, triumphant all rolled in one and over a little inch square of peppermint wrapper! Check Mate, I crinkle the wrapper, " I have candy..." I call out coaxingly. Daybreak was born with the world's largest sweet tooth. Most horses would attempt to stand on an ear for a peppermint. It is a perfect treat and one that comes wrapped in the most enticing sound, crinkling cellophane. Daybreak freezes, he looks in the dark night like one of the statues that dot the landscape at the battlefield of Gettysburg. He is erect and proud, ears are pricked forward intent on the goal, candy!

I grab and my fingers wrap around the leather face piece, GOT YOU! At the moment I realize I plan to have the arm ripped from me before I would ever let go of this halter, he was my prisoner and my salvation. For in a few moments a reunion with my son and the glow of finding a best friend nearly lost will warm me to the bugger once more. Right now we have to get to Tim. I turn and see the long field rolling away in front of me. We are in a top corner, Tim had headed to a bottom corner. I know which way to head as the police cruiser has several companions now and so many headlights and twirling blue and red lights pierce the night. It looks like a major crime scene up by the bar way an easy task to head back with the beacon as powerful as any lighthouse and then some. The uneven ground, my eyes having all the light come and go makes walking a bit more of a challenge. I almost fall but just spend a second swinging from the halter and Daybreak braces his weight to support my effort to regain footing. In that moment the look crosses his face, she isn't letting go, he thinks. He breathes out a long sigh and admits, game over.

I call out a couple times to Tim and finally see the beam of a flashlight bobbing through the field toward me, I see the glow of his smile before we are close. Daybreak sees his boy and picks up the pace. Once he has Tim and the rope is securely on his halter I become a useless accoutrement to the game. Daybreak knows there is an audience at the roadside and begins to prance in that direction. If you have never seen a Morgan horse do a park trot it is beautiful their fore arms coming level with the ground in an animated action of grace and style. Game over, was a reality but it had become showtime!

Like the mighty Niagara the adrenaline rushed from me in one huge swoosh and I was left with the tiny squeeze light in the middle of the field and boy and horse were off on the parade to the finish line. By now I'm nearly dragging my feet over each hummock of grass and look up to mark the police lights distance and back to the ground to watch my footing. I hear all the voices ahead Tim has arrived and everyone is happy to see him. His Uncle Steve had arrived with the trailer and we could get back to he farm. They all wait for me, the straggler to come up the field and then we all are getting ready to load Daybreak but Tim is anxious is eyes dart back to the trailer and me again, he is almost in a panic. " What?" I don't understand the glances. my mind is like sludge. " Mom, my guns are in the trailer, I was cleaning them before I slept, they're in there. " " Sooooo," I reply. " Mom, we're in Massachusetts!" Then it registers, toughest gun laws in the nation. He does know his laws and handling rules perfectly. Even though we only fire blanks a gun is a gun. I take the rope that's clipped on Daybreak. You just go quietly move them into the truck and lock it and I will talk to the officers and thank them for catching Daybreak. He scurries off and I pull the horse up effectively blocking the view. I am far to tired for a another chapter in our eve that includes explaining exactly why we have two pistols in a horse trailer with a boy and horse.

Saddled by: Susan Richards - Book Review

I just finished a great read! Saddled by: Susan Richards (isbn 978-0-547-24172-2 ) What a good way to kick off summer, by reading a book that keeps you enthralled until the last page. You understand that it was the title and the absolutley elegant horse head on the cover that made me pick it up. I pick up every horse book, but it is the story unfolded on the inside that made me read with such interest. A life to bear in unbelieveable personal battles is revealed here in Susan's words so carefully crafted into story. It could be a study in the effects of Alcoholism, its pervasive damage across generations and that would sound like a hard read. Susan found the life jacket she needed to pull herself out of that swirl wrapped in the chestnut coat and mane of her dear Morgan horse Georgia. It is the relationship of Susan and Georgia that makes this healing story a must read. http://www.susan-richards.com/ Follow the weblink to learn more about Susan's books, I am! Now pull out the library card and settle back in the hammock for a great read - enjoy. Next up for me, her book, Chosen By A Horse.