Person:Ralph Whitmore (1)

Circumstances have taken away my need for a Saddle Horse and I have sold my old saddler. It seemed the best thing to do but it leaves me with a guilty feeling in my heart as though I had betrayed a friend, and a great longing that will be satisfied only by the feel of a good horse under me and the breeze blowing in my face.

I have always loved a good horse but my greatest attachments have been for my saddle horses. They become a pal as no other horse does. Those holding my warmest memories are Custer, an old buckskin cow pony. I can't remember when I began to ride him. He can account for many of the apppiest hours of my boyhood. Later, Don, a beautiful chestnut horse. A greater amount of endurance, beauty and mischief could not be put up in one package. I loved him with all my boyish heart, but he left on me scars that I will carry to my grave. Another favorite was Glory, a great little standard bred mare that I broke myslef when she was a three year old. On her, our first baby took her first horse back ride andy wife loved her dearly. But head and shoulder above them all stands Toney.

I rode into Neligh, Nebraska one afternoon in need of a good horse for hard work and hard riding, but one that would not tie up much money for me. I put up my saddle horse at Henry Wilson's barn and told him I needed a horse. He scratched his head and thought for a minute, then told me of two or three horses that might be good prospects. Then he said, "No, let's go up town first." So we went up twon and henry talked to a number of men and in a little while came to me with the information that he had found just the horse that I wanted. In a few minutes we were in a car on our way to a pasture where the horse was running. A man at the place rode out to bring the hroses in, a bunch of thirty-five heead, all branded, all young except my prospective mount and he still had the spriit of youth. I judged him to be ten years old at least. It was early spring and they were all long haired and ill kpet; wild and wirey. With some difficulty they were driven into the corral. Toney was the last one in. He seemed wilder than the others and could out run them all. Wild and unkept as he was I was at once drawin to the horse. He had sight such as one seldom finds in any but the Kentucky saddle horse and a smooth rhythmic action that was irrestable. He had a bood body, short back and wonderful straight smooth legs. We had difficul.ty in catching him even in the small corral. When caught he snorted and trembled but made no move to get away. The owner assured me that he was a great horse but admitted that every time he got loose I would have the very "Dickens" of a time to catch him. I was a little suspicious of him but put the saddle on and gave him a five minute tryout that pleased me well. The deal was soon concluded and I rode my new horse back to town, where I transferred the saddle again to the other horse and started home. It was a long ride filled with pleasant anticipation. Next day I trimmed six months growth from his feet and feed and grooming soon had him looking fit and fine.

I soon found that for a cattle horse, he had been trained to the last word and for cutting, I have never sat upon his equal. He was playful, mischievious and fun-loving as a boy and his intelligence was almoust uncanny.

I tried to teach him to be caught more easily and he at wonce began to respond. Beforee I had had him a month I rode him a three hundred mile trip, campted by the roadside and let him graze where ever I made camp. I didn't even put a hobble on him and had no trouble catchin him. Since then I have ridden him many Hundred miles. Together we have feasted and gone hungry; we have worked and played; endured burning suns and freezing winds, and I never found him wanting.

To a greater degree than any horse I have ever known he possessed that elusive something that in human beings we call personality. He was quick to respond to kindness and care and just as quick to resent misuse. Those hat incurred his displeasure he hated with the bitterness of a savage. With all his appreciation of kindness he had to be governed with a firm hand. He was a man's horse. He must know his master yet when he recognized that master both kind and firm he served him with a devotion that was grand.

One of his fine accomplishments was getting loose when tied, either by getting his halter off or his rope untied. When camping, I usually left him loose to graze at night, but some times, for one reason or another, I would tie him. At such times it was his delight to slip his halter and come and feed beside my bed. It seemed to be not desire to be loose but to show me he could get loose. Many a night I have left him tied and wakened to find him nosing about my bed.

There was in his nature too, a strong strain of vanity. He loved to show off before a crowd. Though I had ridden him sixty miles or more, if we came into town he would go down main street with head and tail up, stepping as though he were leading the Labor Day parade.

Among my cherished memories shall always be those long, long rides across the great gpairies on this horse and evenings in camp among the high peaks of the Rockies where he, with Molly, the sturdy but thracherous little pack pony, cropped the grass about the camp. I shall always miss that soft whinny and extended black muzzle with when he always greeted me at morning.

[Dad wrote this clear back in 1924. He had such a love for a good horse all his life.]

1. ↑ William Bruce Whitmore. Whitmore, William Bruce, personal letter to Carol Whitmore Timmerman, dated September 4, 1969. Includes geneal. (September 4, 1969).
2. ↑ ^2.0 2.1 Blood, Barbara Whitmore. Personal Letter to HBW, dated Feb 23, 1994., Author Address: Sandpoint, ID. (23 Feb 1994).
3. ↑ ^3.0 3.1 Social Security Administration. Social Security Death Index: Death Master File, database. (Alexandria, Virginia: National Technical Information Service)
   SSN 507-10-0847.
4. ↑ Blood, Barbara Whitmore. Personal Letter to HBW, dated Feb 23, 1994., Author Address: Sandpoint, ID. (23 Feb 1994)
   Family History Sheet.
5. ↑ !940 US Census.

   Ralph B. Whitmore, Head, b. Nebr

6. ↑ FindaGrave 79738899.