"I grew up on the south side of Syracuse except for four years in Ridgewood, N.J. when my Dad was transferred to New York City when I was 12 to 16.  I had my first horse, Star, given to me there by a friend who could no longer keep her - and I didn't dare  tell my parents until I could show that I could support her since those were early post- depression days and I knew my parents couldn't afford a horse. I had a lot of jobs, I baby sat, worked in a tree nursery, provided pet care for people who were on vacation, cleaned houses, etc. and then, after two months, I told them and they allowed me to keep her.  She was a 16 hand part thoroughbred.

We moved to a little farm in Jamesville when my Dad got transferred back to CNY. I was 16 and spent my senior year of high school in Jamesville when all 12 grades and kindergarten were in one building.  There were 19 seniors.

 

After serving in the Air Force for 2 years, Dick was training Saddlebreds, Tennessee Walking horses and Hackneys for the undertaker, Carl Ballweg, at the Sunnyhill Farm in DeWitt. .There was also a Morgan stallion there for training, Dick thinks he was registered as Allen's Indian Boy, by Cornwallis and out of Betsy Ross.  They called him Runalong.

 

My blacksmith told me about this trainer over in DeWitt who had a beautiful strawberry roan and white Walking horse stallion, Snuffy, and took me and a friend over to see him. Frankly, I was more impressed with Snuffy, but Dick invited me over to watch him train the horses.  I would ride Star from my home on the Jamesville-Manlius Rd. to Sunnyhill, about 6 miles along the road shoulders; then when it was time to go home, he would ride with me all the way home on his stallion, Snuffy. We made this trip in all kinds of weather. - An interesting courtship.  Sometimes I could get my parent's car and drive over to go with him when he took out hayrides with Mr. Ballweg's big Percherons. 

Dick grew up in Nedrow, working with horses at  nearby riding stables from the time he was about 10 or 11,  Bailey's Stables and Crestmount, about a mile away.  He did chores and took out trail rides and spent many hours a week on horseback.
 

We were married in 1951, he was 22, I was 18.  We lived and worked  at Sunnyhill for a while, but then I got a job at the Syracuse Savings Bank and he worked at the Byrne Dairy.
 

We bought the weanling stallion Allen's Mohawk Chief in the fall of 1952-  for $150.00, the beginning of our Morgan ventures. Later, in the fall of 1959, Dick went to the Cornell Horseshoeing School which was a year after we bought Tanglewood Farm.