The Eighty-Dollar Champion - Elizabeth Letts [133]
On November 12, Harry took a break from the routine downstairs to come up and watch the international jumping contest. There were teams from Canada, Mexico, France, and the United States, among others.
The sentimental favorite on the American team was the old horse Trail Guide, with Frank Chapot on board. Harry had a soft spot for Trail Guide, a relic of the old days, when the international team jumping had been a military affair. At twenty-one years old, Trail Guide was like an old colonel among a bunch of civilians. The year before, Harry had taken a tour through Amish Country, trying to learn something about Snowman’s origins, and he’d found an old blacksmith who was pretty sure his horse had been the product of an Amish dray horse bred to an army remount sire. Harry could see the similarity between the two old troupers.
Trail Guide had been a perennial champion for the U.S. Equestrian Team: low scorer at both the ’56 and the ’60 Olympic games, he had put in six flawless rounds at Washington and taken home the international championship at Harrisburg. With Frank Chapot aboard, he had salvaged the American record at Washington in 1958, the year Snowman won the open jumper championship with Dave Kelley in the saddle. Now the great champion was competing in his last show.
In fact, originally, the team had planned to officially retire him at the end of this year’s Garden competition, leading him out under the traditional blanket of roses. But that plan had been scrapped because American Horse Shows Association rules forbade a horse from competing in the same event in which he was retired. The decision was made to postpone the retirement. The team needed the horse to compete.
And Trail Guide had not disappointed, winning the first class for the American team. Tonight the international teams were competing for the Good Will Challenge Trophy, a huge silver bowl. Thus far, 1960 was a banner year for the U.S. team, which had brought home the first ever team medal at the summer Olympics in Rome, second only to the jumping powerhouse Germany. Harry had followed the results from afar, reveling in his old mount Sinjon’s accomplishments and proud that he’d been the first to spot the horse’s potential. And after the string of defeats in ’58 and ’59, the American team had just triumphed at both Washington and Harrisburg. This November at the Garden, the Americans were ready to finally bring the trophy home.
Here at the Garden, the course was high, the times were swift, and the competition was intense. At the end of the first round for the Good Will Challenge, there was a four-way tie—four horses with clean rounds: Trail Guide with Frank Chapot, George Morris of the United States, Tom Gayford of Canada, and a Venezuelan horse and rider. The jump-off started: the Venezuelan knocked down two poles, but Morris had a clean round. The Canadian also put in a clean round, but his time was not as fast. When Trail Guide entered the ring, George Morris, on High Noon, had the round to beat. The pressure was on Trail Guide’s rider. To win the class, he would have to go clean and fast enough to beat Morris on time.
The brave old horse flew over the first two fences, sailing over them clean. But over the third fence, a double oxer, in the blink of an eye, something went horribly wrong. He caught a foot on a rail and fell in a gruesome flipping crash, sliding into the side barrier with a sickening thud. As the crowd sat in stunned silence, Chapot got to his feet, unhurt, but the grand old horse lay uncannily still.
From the stands, Harry instantly knew that the situation was bad. Used to jumping in to help whenever there was a problem, he leapt over the barrier, following the horse show vet Dr. Joseph O’Dea, a friend of his, into the ring. The horse was alive but not moving. When a horse falls and is hurt, he thrashes, his instinct telling him to get to his feet. A horse