Horse & Hound
Three Generations of Foxhunters at Tennessee Valley
Click photos for full size. / Cristy Grimsley/Hernandez photo
Seven-year-old Skyler Beauchene was the youngest member of the field out with the Tennessee Valley Hunt when hounds met at Riverplains, the family farm, in Strawberry Plains, Tennessee. The more senior generations of Skyler’s family in the photo are State Senator, Grandfather Frank Nicely (left) and international trainer and rider, Uncle Jose Hernandez (right).
Riverplains is one of the founding farms for the Tennessee Valley Hunt. They do organic growing, carriage driving, dressage, three-day eventing, and so much more. I also live there. Could not be anywhere else!
Skyler is mounted on his pony Cruisy; Riverplains owner Senator Frank is mounted on Farrah; and Jose is riding Roma, a carriage horse for his four-in-hand. All the horses are owned by Skyler’s mother Rachel Nicely, Frank’s daughter. Rachel also trains and has hunted since she was very little.
Old North Bridge Hounds in the Footprints of Colonial History
Old North Bridge Master and huntsman Virginia Zukatynski and hounds leave the Mary Martha Chapel at Longfellow's Wayside Inn followed by piper Thomas Childs, the field, and guests after the Blessing of Hounds. / Jack McCrossan photo
by Patricia Jackson
The Old North Bridge Hounds (MA) held their Blessing of Hounds on the grounds of historic Longfellow’s Wayside Inn in Sudbury, Massachusetts on October 17, 2015. The blessing took place at Henry Ford’s Martha Mary Chapel on a perfect fall day in New England under clear blue skies and beautiful fall foliage. Master and huntsman Mrs. Virginia Zukatynski, hounds, staff, members, and guests joined together and proceeded past the Inn to the chapel for the blessing.
Spectators enjoyed the sights and sounds as Joint-Master Marjorie Franko led horses and riders over the brick pathways and across the old bridge, following the music of the bagpiper. Longfellow’s Wayside Inn has a long history of hosting foxhunts on the property, including the Norfolk Hunt, the old Millwood Hounds, Myopia, and Harry Worcester Smith's Middlesex Hounds. Situated on the Boston Post Road, one of the oldest commissioned roads in the U.S., much of it built along the two-foot wide Pequot Path used first by native Americans, the Wayside Inn has the distinction of being the country’s oldest operating inn, offering hospitality to travelers along the old road since 1716.
The Wayside Inn, made internationally famous by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s book of poems, Tales of a Wayside Inn, was run by the Howe family. Longfellow visited the Inn in 1862 and his book of poems was published the following year. In it he republished his poem, “Paul Revere’s Ride,” which contains his immortal phrase, “Listen my children and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.” Henry Ford bought the Inn in 1923, restored it, and formed the charitable trust that operates the Inn today.
Tommy Jackson, ex-MFH and Huntsman (1945–2015)
Thomas H. Jackson, huntsman for twenty-five years at the Mission Valley Hunt (KS) and huntsman and Joint-Master of the Coal Valley Hounds (KS), passed away on Wednesday, October 21, 2015 at age seventy. Tommy enjoyed a stellar reputation in the hunting world. I can honestly say that I never saw any huntsman more passionate about seeing the job done right.
Born in Bellevue, Pennsylvania on June 19, 1945, to Joseph Henry and Mary Agnes (McAuliffe) Jackson, he went to work at a very young age due to family financial struggles. He loved the outdoors and farm life. One of his first jobs was at a dairy farm in the Sewickley area.
Tommy was drafted into the Army on October 20, 1965 and received an Honorable Discharge two years later. He served one tour in Vietnam with notable honors: National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal with two Bronze Stars, Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal, and Marksman Rifle Award.
After returning from Vietnam, Tommy went to work as a stable groom at the Allegheny Country Club. He grew fond of horses and horseback riding, and this job launched him on his life-long career. Through the club's affiliation with the Sewickley Hunt, he worked his way up to the position of Professional Huntsman. Foxhunting was not just a job or a hobby for Tommy; it was his passion.
The Irish Hunter: An Exceptional Horse Across Any Country
The Irish Hunter by Noel Mullins, 2015, Forewords by Professor Patrick Wall, Chairman of Horse Sport Ireland and Hugh Leonard, Chairman of The Traditional Irish Horse Association, color, 208 pages, CaseboundThe Irish Hunter: An Exceptional Horse Across Any Country includes a portfolio of some five hundred photographic images taken at more than sixty hunts by photo/journalist Noel Mullins in his travels in Ireland and abroad over the last twenty years. More than two hundred of the images illustrate the exceptional jumping ability of this marvellous horse tackling a wide variety of natural cross country obstacles such as stone walls, ditches, hedges, streams, and double banks as well as man-made obstacles such as gates, concrete railings, metal barriers, wire, pallets, and even the bed post and church pew that one might occasionally come across hunting in the Irish countryside!
In hunting fields in North America, Mullins has photographed the Irish Hunter out with the Green Spring Valley, Genesee Valley, Orange County, Mr Stewart's Cheshire, Lowcountry, and Palm Beach Hounds.
In his Introduction the author looks at how horses originated in Ireland from wild horses 28,000 years ago to domesticated horses circa 2,400 BC, and some of the various breeds that graced the Irish countryside since, such as the Irish Hobby, the Garraun, Donegal, Cushendall, Rathlin, and the Kerry Bog Pony. Then there’s the Irish Draught Horse, the Connemara Pony and the Thoroughbred, whose offspring give rise to what we know today as the Irish Hunter, also known as the Irish Draught Cross and the Irish Sport Horse.
Passing the Horn at Potomac
Photo by Karen Kandra Wenzel Larry Pitts, huntsman for thirty-five seasons at the Potomac Hunt (MD), passes the horn to huntsman Brian Kiely at Opening Meet, 2015. Pitts leaves behind a brilliant legacy of breeding American foxhound Champions and Grand Champions, including the impossibly handsome MFHA Centennial Grand Champion, Potomac Jefferson 2005. Posted November 20, 2015
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A Fast Day and Foxes Aplenty at Blue Ridge
Huntsman Graham Buston, hounds, staff, and field of the Blue Ridge Hunt / Joanne Maisano photo
The November morning was unseasonably warm as I tacked up my beautiful Cleveland Bay/TB cross, Fearnought. It was a surprise that I had come home from school, but with my mother keeping him fit for me, I knew that he would be all ready for a day’s hunting. Conveniently, the Blue Ridge Hunt (VA) meet was only a fifteen-minute hack from my grandmother’s stable where I keep my horse. By the time we arrived I was already very warm in my formal coat and wondering, ‘Did I drive all the way home for nothing?’
Foxes
TRed fox / Illustration by Doug Piferhe Pennsylvania Game Commission has published on its website a series of excellent Wildlife Notes on nearly a hundred species of wildlife to be found in that state. With their kind permission, Foxhunting Life earlier republished their comprehensive study of the Eastern coyote, and here we present the Wildlife Note on foxes, once again with permission, which we believe our foxhunting readers will find substantive and revealing.
Red and gray foxes are small, agile carnivores belonging to the same family (Canidae) as the dog, coyote, and wolf. Both red and gray foxes are found throughout Pennsylvania. They are intelligent predators with extremely sharp senses of sight, smell, and hearing (a fox can hear a mouse squeal from about 150 feet).
Boot Camp at Belle Meade
Belle Meade First whipper-in Barbara Lee organizes the hunt's annual Foxhunting Seminar for all new members. / Bella Vita Fotographie photo
Individuals interested in joining the Belle Meade Hunt (GA) quickly learn what they need to know in the hunting field, and they also learn what is expected of them as members. The hunt holds an annual Foxhunting Seminar that all new members are required to attend, whether or not they have hunted elsewhere.
New members learn that they are expected to have fun and to be contributors. “Mandatory Volunteerism” is the principle, and every member must subscribe to it. From that institutional expectation, the unique Belle Meade culture has developed.
It all began with the hunt’s founder, the late Master James Wilson, an inspirational leader who believed in teamwork. According to the seminar handout explaining the principle of mandatory volunteerism, “Master James knew that it took every member chipping in to make Belle Meade the place we have all come to love. As a member you were expected to respond with a willing, ‘Yes, sir,’ to anything you were asked to do. Most of us would have jumped through hoops of fire if the man asked us to! One of the unique things about our hunt that drew all of you here was the tradition of working as a family for the good of the hunt.”
Chapman’s Mariah Is Virginia Field Hunter Champion
Mariah was "a great mover" with "perfect manners." / Richard Clay photo
by Betsy Burke Parker
Farmington Hunt rider Carolyn Chapman and her paint-cross mare Mariah claimed the coveted title of Virginia Field Hunter Champion on Sunday, October 25, 2015. In victory, she bested seventeen competitors, the best of the best, according to organizers, sent by ten of Virginia's marquis foxhunting clubs.
The Virginia Championship is widely considered the most competitive of a handful of hunter trial events offered around the nation each fall. The event was hosted at Old Whitewood Farm by the Orange County Hounds. Last year's winner from Orange County, Neil Morris, MFH, said he began organizing this year’s competition soon after his victory in October of last year.
Chapman partnered her black and white eight-year-old to earn the nod from the judges after three phases. “We both picked her out as a contender in the hack phase,” said judge Norman Fine, editor of the online magazine, Foxhunting Life. Co-judge Tommy Lee Jones, huntsman of Fauquier's Casanova Hunt, agreed. “She stood out. Great mover, perfect manners.”
Martin Scott and the Modern English Foxhound
We republish, with permission, James Barclay’s article about Martin Scott, former MFH and eminent foxhound breeder. Martin Scott has been an engaged member of Foxhunting Life’s, Panel of Experts since our beginnings and has cheerfully answered any and all questions posed to him by our readers, for which we are continually grateful.
by James Barclay
Martin Scott visits with a descendant of Glog Nimrod 1904 / James Barclay photo
Martin Scott is an extraordinary man. As well as being a true and dedicated foxhunter, he is probably the only person I know who has a completely encyclopaedic brain when it comes to the breeding of the Modern English Foxhound. There is no one quite like him when you need to tap into a vast depth of knowledge on this subject—not only their breeding but the attributes of each and every generation.
