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Post by proudwilliam on Nov 20, 2014 22:12:02 GMT
Going off for day rides with packed lunch and 2p for the pubic phone. No mobiles, even hardly any traffic! Dad bought me a trap and my friend and I trained Darkie my elderly Dartmoor to pull it. We used to go off with the pet lamb! cat and kittens. and ride around the farm. That was 55 plus years ago. I remember the Riding magazine used to have a scheme whereby you could win silver medals and bronze for novice show ponies. I still have them!! Sad or what. Dad having to write the sick note when we went hunting.! or to a show. or the blacksmith visit. I hardly went out to the cinema or shopping as I was always out with the ponies. 1963 the blizzard I had 5 ponies in and clipped. Dad put straw around the field so I could exercise them.! Could not go to school for weeks as we lived on a hill and could only get down on the tractor. Having to dig sheep out of 6 foot snow drifts.! Happy days.
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Post by clifton on Nov 20, 2014 22:15:26 GMT
I think it probably was H&h as my older friend has hundreds of copies, which I used to spend hours reading when I stayed at her house
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 20, 2014 22:20:39 GMT
KJM that pony was called Monty/Mongomery or something like that, I remember it too.
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kayjayem
Happy to help....a lot
Posts: 10,046
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Post by kayjayem on Nov 20, 2014 22:22:07 GMT
I have in my mind it was called Mountsomething prefix? ?? Please someone put me out of my misery lol!
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kayjayem
Happy to help....a lot
Posts: 10,046
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Post by kayjayem on Nov 20, 2014 22:22:43 GMT
Brindle it's driving me mad now I really need to know
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 20, 2014 22:35:29 GMT
It was bay if I remember and did well in the show ring
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Post by lastchance on Nov 20, 2014 22:51:09 GMT
I had green reins, to match the green numnah, green string girth and a green and white browband .. remember the plastic ones you could wipe clean? YES!! I was a member of Spartan Riding Club which was based at Lizard Lane Riding School South Shields and went to Whickham Riding School Summer Camp near Newcastle. Anyone know if either of those riding schools still there? Loving this thread and after a long absence it's prompted me to log back in again. Another old Spartan Riding Club member here too. Late 70's/1980's for me. It wasnt based at the riding school then though.
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Post by lastchance on Nov 20, 2014 22:54:18 GMT
GaynorStones you have tempted me to join this board. I saw you mention Whickham summer camps and I was there too. I was a pony deprived youngster in the sixties but still enjoyed my riding school adventures and used to ride at Billy Hood's on Whickham highway every Saturday afternoon. I saved up for those summer pony weeks too which always ended in a gymkhana on the Friday. We had great fun looking after our favourite pony for the week but as Hoods was a dealer the ponies were constantly changing and we would weep buckets when our best ones were sold on. Later I also rode at Murton in North Shields which opened when I was about twelve. No indoor school back then. Then you mention Lizard and my first horse came from there. She was a golden dun called Sally. She did everything for our family and was a wonderful versatile mare who lived and enjoyed work till she was thirty, just pts a few years ago. So I hope you can post a bit more about those far off times. Here we are still horse lovers today and I'm enjoying carriage driving with my Highland pony that I bred myself, plus keeping several others at home. Who would have thought it? My first pony came from Lizard too. "Spot" - he cost a grand total of £80.
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Post by proudwilliam on Nov 20, 2014 23:04:48 GMT
Our first lorry had a canvas roof we would role it back on the way home from shows and sit up in the luton. Going to HOYS at Wembley watching the classes held out on the cinder tracks. No passes needed could go anywhere. Miss De Beaumont bred beautiful ponies Shalbourne Lindy Loo a strawberry roan 13.2. was my favourite.
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Post by rocknroll on Nov 20, 2014 23:13:24 GMT
I can remember the wormer Frisk. A bit of a dealer was educating me one day and was earnestly telling me that he was using Frisk for Dots! Puzzled me a bit until some years later I realised he meant Bots! Brilliant for killing free range chickens if you didn't pick up the dung! I also remember three of us riding our ponies through Whippindell Woods near Croxley Green in Hertfordshire, which was forbidden and being confronted by a stern looking woman with a massive great dane who blocked our path. She gave us to the count of three to get out of the woods. Of course we cantered off yelling an assortment of expletives and have to say that is the only time I have actually come face to face with the formidable Barbara Woodhouse . . . Siiiittt!!
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Post by gillwales on Nov 21, 2014 6:27:47 GMT
I think it was kayjayem, Robert Oliver selected the horse for the winner, I recall a 15 hand bay pba , stable name Monty, the winners name was Helen.
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Post by maxandpaddy on Nov 21, 2014 9:35:53 GMT
I wasnt into music or boys, my teenage pin up was Ryan's Son !
You lived for the showjumping on tv, you actually felt like you knew them all because it was the same people and the same horses frequently doing battle. I can remember a lot of the names and the horses but couldnt name many of todays - Caroline Bradley, David Broome, Steven Hadley, Harvey Smith, Eddie Macken, Liz Edgar the horses I couldnt wait to watch Anglezark, Milton, Boomerang, Sunnora, further back Stroller, Sunsalve, Flannagan. There wasnt as many overseas riders but I do remember the wonderful Paul Schockemohle and Deister and Nelson Passoa. In the eventing world Ginny then Holgate with Pricesless and Nightcap were big fav's
When they use to dress up at the end of Olympia and take the mickey out of something - David Broome and Harvey Smith doing Barbara Woodhouse was hysterical
Its all so commercial and proffessional nowadays, back then they were rough ''buggers'' hahaaa
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 21, 2014 9:39:55 GMT
Hahah my pin up was Pennwood Forge Mill!!!!
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sarahp
Happy to help
Posts: 9,510
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Post by sarahp on Nov 21, 2014 9:56:25 GMT
Yes, I remember Frisk too, and wasn't the prize horse Mountwood something, Monty for short?
I can remember being in hospital when my son was born (10 days then) watching RIHS SJ on TV. The great Anne Muir was on the credits with her scurry pair. Same names here maxandpaddy, but what about Pat Smythe with Tosca, and Harry Llewellyn with Foxhunter, later the prefix for his Welsh A stud? And Craven A - my grandfather smoked those - who was it who rode him, Peter someone? I had a severe case of tongue-tiedness much later on when Alan Oliver addressed a casual remark to me at a local show - he'd been there course building and I wasn't expecting to be actually spoken to by one of my childhood heroes. The Hadley boys came from our neck of the woods so we always had a soft spot for them. Vibart with a kick back over every jump. Almost all the horses were British bred from British breeds - when Caroline Bradley imported the Dutch WB stallion Marius no-one would use him at stud "you can't breed a showjumper, top ones are just freaks". How things change! I remember the Barbara Woodhouse act, and my 14.2 came from Fred Hartill's dealers yard, the owner of Pennwood Forge Mill.
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Post by kaptinkook on Nov 21, 2014 10:40:59 GMT
Using my cactus cloth at the moment. Works brilliantly on a white mudlark Connie. Obviously wants to be bay and succeeding rather well.
My heroes were the D'Inzeo brothers from Italy. Dropped nosebands and sheepskin nosebands were the 'in' items.
Rode seven miles to forge. Ponies lived out. Rarely exercised except at weekends, but hunted and showjumped. Seemed to survive very well.
We lived in Ireland and thought showponies were a bit of a joke then. But had wonderful times at the RDS - Dublin Horse Show.
Oh dear, bringing it all back. I am still riding at 72 - wish I had a pound for every person who says "are you still riding?"
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Post by maxandpaddy on Nov 21, 2014 11:03:21 GMT
I remember Marius sarahp !
The Hickstead Derby seemed bigger and tougher back then, I remember a skitzy grey with a female rider leaping straight off the top of the bank one year
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kayjayem
Happy to help....a lot
Posts: 10,046
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Post by kayjayem on Nov 21, 2014 11:45:10 GMT
KJM that pony was called Monty/Mongomery or something like that, I remember it too. Was it Montcalm something or other? Oooooohhhhh it's driving me nuts now!
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 21, 2014 11:54:42 GMT
Im going to google it!!!
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 21, 2014 12:01:15 GMT
Maxandpaddy that was Annette Lewis on Tutein that jumped off the bank!!!
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Post by proudwilliam on Nov 21, 2014 12:21:53 GMT
Wildfire and David Broome. I think he bought Wildfire from the household cavalry for £25 as he was unrideable.
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Post by oldschooler on Nov 21, 2014 12:55:31 GMT
No shows for us, just hacking and PC, with occasional hunting and I do remember doing mounted messengering for the local ODE, no radios used then. My idol Richard Meade was riding, on if I remember correctly a roan horse called Barbery. Yes to yellow string gloves, jute and canvas rugs with blankets folded back in the V, jodhpurs with baggy thighs and joddy boots, no long ones, string girths and plastic browbands. Hats with elastic, no body protectors and learning to jump with no reins or stirrups over lines of caveletti. Transport was first a hired lorry, also used by the knackers and on at least one occasion with dead horses' legs hanging up in the corner - yes really. Later we had a heavy, home built trailer pulled by the LR from my father's business, usually used for towing for broken down lorries. I learned to drive in this round the fields aged about 15. Ponies were kept out, no stables at all, in fields owned by a very old retired head groom from a very posh family who could remember when he broke the horses side saddle for the ladies to ride and the whole lot, horses, grooms and all went down to London for the Season and rode in Rotten Row. Carriages then too, his memories must have gone back to the late 19th/early 20th C. The mothers of the ponies' owners used to keep an eye on him, and his cottage always smelt of the pot of boiling barley and linseed on the stove, don't ever remember feeding it to anything though! The riding school we went to before we had ponies - that of the jumping lessons - was run by an ex-cavalry colonel, very fierce and I've done the pennies under the knees bit. All horses and ponies were fed varying quantities of the same mix - oats, bran and chaff, as in chopped up hay, mixed in a huge pile on the floor by the colonel himself with a shovel. They had one mare there with a docked tail too. When we had our first pony, a green Welsh 4yo shared between me and my sister, he ate pony nuts supplemented by all our suitable veggie peelings, mine still get the latter today. Obviously my era sarahp. No long rubber riding boots, no stretch jods - Jacatex everything because it was so cheap. We rode in wellies, no hat and usually bareback. Remember helping all day so I could have a free ride taking some of the horses to the field for the week during the summer. My first time was on a 16.2hh horse, I was bareback and no hat. hacked it about 2 miles to the summer field. Gosh did it have a back bone, I'll say no more about that. I biked there and back to the riding school, about 4 miles and very steep on the way back. The big treat was being allowed to take "my" ponies' bridle home to clean. Carried it on my shoulder, thought I was the bees knees. I had a succession of ponies that were "mine" at that riding school - Greenwood's at Chadderton near Oldham, cried buckets when he sold one. There was always a replacement in the stable but you could tell as soon as you arrived on the yard - everyone gave you that knowing look. Cannot blame him, we made ponies into bombproof angels that were obviously sold for huge profits to some of the posters on here. A lot of you were obviously very lucky and had your own ponies. I bought my first pony in 1968 when i left school and saved up for him. He was a blanket spotted probably around 13hh, everything looked a lot bigger then. I loved that pony to bits, took him to my first grooming job in Sussex and sold him to Sweden. They had no nice ponies there and a jockey came over and exported a few back. Other memories Ten Town an Australian TV programme about a group of kids who had their own ponies - loved it. Pony magazine, still going I see. The Horse of the year Show and that music. (I want it at my funeral.) It didn't do me any harm, still riding 55 years after I began. Once it's in your blood it's there.
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Post by oldschooler on Nov 21, 2014 13:00:30 GMT
KJM that pony was called Monty/Mongomery or something like that, I remember it too. Was it Montcalm something or other? Oooooohhhhh it's driving me nuts now! I seem to think it had Bally in the name. remember it, it was not that long ago, well not if you are my age.
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Post by tountmarastud on Nov 21, 2014 13:02:43 GMT
The pony that was won was called Mountbally Hi Fly or something and she was called Helen Spencer - I am trying to remember without googling - and she had glasses and did the 15 hand class before intermediates were invented. Or was it Mountfield Bali Hai - oh its annoying me now!!!
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Post by oldschooler on Nov 21, 2014 13:07:32 GMT
The pony that was won was called Mountbally Hi Fly or something and she was called Helen Spencer - I am trying to remember without googling - and she had glasses and did the 15 hand class before intermediates were invented. Or was it Mountfield Bali Hai - oh its annoying me now!!! I reckon you could be right with Bali hai. But mountfield doesn't sound right. Really confused now. Glad you agree bally or Bali was in the name.
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Post by maxandpaddy on Nov 21, 2014 13:09:30 GMT
I'm getting no work done today these are so good to read !
Back to important stuff - Wellies and the wonderful relationship we all had with them, I use to to squeeze and jam my wellies in the stirrups to get them in. Come winter no matter what condition they were in or how cold it was you added plastic bags to your feet - what was that all about?
Hahaaaaa x
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Post by Philippa on Nov 21, 2014 13:15:39 GMT
I wasnt into music or boys, my teenage pin up was Ryan's Son ! I loved Ryan and was fortunate that when I worked for John I used to ride him regularly. I was at Johns that terrible day when he fell at Hickstead and died later. His stable was empty for some time. I used to cry every year when they showed the hickstead Derby previous winners when Ryan came on (still do if im honest!!! ) He & Milton were horses of a lifetime and im honoured to say I knew them both personally.
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Post by lastchance on Nov 21, 2014 14:17:02 GMT
Mountwood Bally Hi
I remember that competition well. Runners up got a signed David Broome annual if I remember rightly. The top prize was £3k to spend on a horse or pony, its full wardrobe was provided and all keep and trainer costs were covered for twelve months. At the end of the twelve months they'd help the person sell the horse too, if need be. Fortunately Monty had a home for life with Helen.
Edited to say it was a really tough thing to enter too. that competition, and went on for weeks and weeks.
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Post by brindlerainbow on Nov 21, 2014 14:42:04 GMT
Has anyone else kept their pony books from the "old days" ? I have just re-read A Dream of Fair Horses by Patricia Leitch but I also have loads from the Collins pony library on my bookcase. Wasn't life simple in those pony books!!!!!
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Post by proudwilliam on Nov 21, 2014 14:56:53 GMT
Kept my scrap book with all the articles in it. My elderly aunt started it for me I won the Pony club D cup once which was the size of an egg cup and to upset me the family would put an egg in it!! how proud I was to win it. Trixie was the pony who's delight was to deposit me on the ground very often.
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Post by richvale on Nov 21, 2014 15:16:29 GMT
MaxandPaddy, liked the wellies quote but we used to stick our cold feet into the muck heap to warm up on cold and frosty mornings after exercising the show-jumpers! I also remember the winter of 1963 when we weren't allowed to go out because it was so cold, snowy snd frosty, Mum would go and feed our two ponies, who were out with jute rugs covered in black bin bags and she would take a bale of hay and two buckets of feed on the handlebars on her bike to the field. Also remember the snowballing effect of the ponies feet!
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