By NANCY JANE KERN
MOST GENERATIONS LIVE through a cultural transition or world change of sorts. My parents saw the wonder of flight when Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart took the headlines. We lived in the 1940s-50s rural community of Austerlitz, NY. The Town was predominantly forest and rural farmland, and I saw actual horsepower become gasoline horsepower. Our farm was originally a sheep farm transitioned to dairy cattle, and my maternal grandparents had the poultry farm just east of us. There was no Taconic State Parkway until the 1960s and we were between Route 66 on the west and Route 22 to the east. We were isolated with at times impassable dirt roads and the neighbor farms and those of relatives were crucial for support.
There were a few cars and farm vehicles, but horses were the most reliable means for work and transport. I grew up with horses as part of our family. Each horse had its unique personality. At age 2 my father held me on his saddle and took me for rides. In another year or two, I was sent out with some oats and a lead rope to bring back the team of horses a quarter mile away in the south pasture. Maria put her head down for the oats and I could attach the rope to her halter.
Nellie was less friendly but would follow us back to the barn to be harnessed for the day’s work. One day Maria accidentally put her huge iron shod hoof on my little foot. I still feel the pain. At age 5, my father bought me a full-sized saddle horse from his sister. I named him Tiger and had the freedom to ride up the road to my grandmother! My poor grandmother was horrified as I cantered into the yard and tied Tiger up in the Wagon House next to the house. I survived bites and kicks and moved on to Dutchess when I was 12 giving Tiger to my sisters. Dutchess was a beautiful pinto devil. She had to be dropped to the ground by ropes and held down to be shod. She bit me black and blue, raced home to the barns, leaped through doorways, and would cut corners near barbed wire fences with me hanging on. When she fell with me and had to be put down, I got shiny black Stormy. He was well trained but terrified of white pebbles in the road. He would rear up and I had to fight to keep him from flipping over backward.
We also acquired a wily Duke, Prince the Morgan who feared men, and Major, a thoroughbred mix who could grab the bit and run like the wind. By then I was in high school and our herd of 5 horses was a happy group that still included ancient Tiger. Horses were freedom for us rural kids, and a life I would never trade. I miss them.
