1970s - 1990s: UVM Emissary AKA Emmy

This was a stallion that belonged to my brother Mitch, but I still miss him to this day.  Emmy was my buddy too the whole time that I was growing up.

Emissary was purchased from the UVM farm as a weanling to be our main breeding stallion because of his impeccable bloodlines with UVM Watchman as his sire and UVM Nifty, his dam and a grand old park mare, who won a lot in her time before becoming a great broodmare for the UVM Farm.

At the time in 1976 when Mitch purchased this gorgeous colt, Emmy was the first UVM bred horse to come to the Pacific Northwest and I believe the first UVM bred horse on the West coast. 

As a kid growing up we had quite a few Beckridge prefix mares from the Seattle, Wash. area, that were all Orcland Royal Don daughters.  Mitch knew that his stallion would cross with all the mares that we had and were breeding with a couple of previous stallions, Beckridge Gingerman and Beckridge Ulendon in the 1960s.  Mitch was right.  Many of this stallion's get became World, National and Regional champions in the 1980s and 1990s in every division including park saddle, park harness, halter, roadster, English Pleasure, Western, Classic Pleasure saddle and driving and even Road Hack with a few nice hunt horses thrown in too.  Many of Emmy’s fillies went straight to people's breeding programs too without being shown they were that nice. 

We only had about six foals a year at our farm with four teenagers and a single mom.  We trained and showed all of our stock by Emmy with the MCM prefix.  Before Emmy my mom’s prefixes were Summerset and later Glentana.  When a soap opera started with her prefix name so she changed to Glentana.  I still see horses around here with our prefixes in their breeding programs when I am looking for horses to buy for customers now.

I could not even begin to mention how many classes Emmy won, but once I figured up he had over 74 Regional, National and a I believe a few World titles thrown in for his 15 years in the show ring in park saddle, park harness and halter.  Mitch even showed him English Pleasure to a few wins and crossed entered back to park just for laughs to show he always had short feet when he was being shown in park classes.

Emmy even won a Regional title in Natural Park Saddle when I showed him at the same show to win the Amateur Park Harness Champion and Mitch showed him to a Reserve Show Champion in Park Harness at the same Farwest Regionals.  This horse had a ton of natural trot and we thought we could prove it by cross entering him in the Natural Park division just for laughs, as it was his last year showing.

The last year Emissary was shown at the Nationals at age 16 he was Reserve Grand National Amateur Park Harness Stallions and 4th in the World in Amateur Park Harness in a very large class of entries. Not bad for an old man showing against horses less than half his age.  The best part was his son, MCM Embassy, was Reserve World Junior Park Saddle and Reserve Grand National Junior Park Saddle Stallions.  We took two horses that year and won two major titles with horses we bred, raised, trained or showed ourselves.

This flashy boy was also Art Perry’s favorite parade horse for about four years before he retired from showing if I remember right so he had quite a few Grand National Parade Horse Finals to impressive list of show ring wins too.

Besides winning many prestigious class A shows Emmy also won his show in the B show system here to help promote the Morgan breed locally.  Emmy won many Washington State High Point Awards in his career in many divisions.  We did believe in showing our Morgans off to other people and other breed owners.  Emmy was such a fine ambassador of his breed with all his My Pretty Pony hairstyle and dashing good looks that everyone would always stop and admire this pretty boy.  They had to see if he was a Morgan because he trotted like a Hackney so even the Saddlebred folks liked him.  The Arabian folks liked him too because of his stunning head with a slight dish and he passed that gorgeous head along to all his foals.

Some of the best memories I have of this grand old horse was not in the show ring.  It was taking him to grade schools and telling little kids about Morgans.  Emmy was always quiet and kind as a stallion.  Mitch taught his horse to do horse tricks too like bow, count and rear up.  The kids absolutely adored the free horse show as we showed him in halter, harness and then bareback and then out came his tricks.  This patient horse was always mobbed him when he was done showing off.  Now that is what a Morgan stallion is known for, being kind to everyone, having lovely foals and also representing the breed well anywhere or any time no matter how many kids were petting him at one time.

I have many happy years of stealing this horse and going for trail rides and praying I did not suck off his show shoes in creeks.  Mitch never did put a lock on his stall and that horse enjoyed a change in his routine. 

I was allowed to show him in Amateur Park Harness classes for years, but always wanted to ride him in the ring too.  But sadly, he was not my horse and I was overruled.  Although I did give Emmy many happy hours away from the show ring and indoor work arena at our farm.  He had fun just chomping grass in the yard while I was outside reading a book in the sunshine.  I also would fall asleep on his back while he was mowing too and we had many happy hours playing lawn mower.

I am just sure Mitch figured I was stealing his stallion, but he could not be home to watch him every single second.  Besides we never came home with any scratches from our adventures of going up and down steep trails and crossing deep creeks.  Emmy was a trail horse, a riding lesson horse for newbies as well as a show horse.  We liked out horses to do what most show horses did not do and get out on the trail even the park horses as it kept their minds fresh.

The way that we sold breedings for years is folks would come to the farm and view trophies from many years of showing in the office and see videos from Emmy’s show career.  The highlight of the day was Mitch would walk Emissary indoors to watch his videos with his company.  That horse had a funny sense of humor and he would hit people with the pillows from the couch or throw the pillows around the room for fun.  If that did not sell breedings it almost always sold one of his foals as he was high powered show horse at the shows or just a very well trained horse standing there indoors schmoozing people.