AT CHICAGO, 75-YEAR-OLD LOULA LONG COMBS AND 15-YEAR-OLD JOE GREATHOUSE SHARED HONORS WITH A CHAMPION NAMED DREAM WALTZ

There were more 10-gallon Stetsons than top hats at the International Live Stock Exposition Horse Show in Chicago, but there was plenty of elegance in the horse show ring and as much color—if of a different kind—as any fashionable Madison Square Garden event produces. Hemmed in by acres of cattle and booths displaying everything for the farm from lightning rods (complete with artificial lightning) to a mechanical mother feeding eight fat white piglets, stylishly attired ladies drove ponies and top-hatted gentlemen rode three-gaited horses about the tanbark in the International Amphitheatre at the stockyards.

Perhaps the most elegant competitor of all, particularly when driving a pair of horses to a phaeton with an attendant in maroon livery riding behind, was 75-year-old Mrs. Loula Long Combs. Her presence adds a very special quality to whatever show she attends, and she never fails to add to her collection of blue ribbons. In Chicago, Mrs. Combs, who has been showing horses since the 19th century, demonstrated with ease that she is still the nation's best whip by winning more first awards than anybody—11.

The ribbons in the junior divisions were competed for with that special intensity that seems to go with children's classes. The very first class of the nine-day horse show was a horsemanship class for boys, and 15-year-old Joe Greathouse, invading the North from Kentucky, won it. A second invasion followed when 40 fellow members of Louisville's Rock Creek Riding Club chartered two Pullmans and arrived for the last day of the show to cheer on Joe and his gray mare, Blue Champagne, in the championship class.

Fifty-seven young riders had entered the big event. Mrs. Greathouse, taking no chances, was at pains to put on the same blue outfit she had worn when her son won his first-day class. Fine riders on good Saddle Horses circled, lined up, worked some more, lined up, worked again. A tense hour passed and finally the decisions were announced. Joe Greathouse had won the horsemanship championship. It was a big win for anyone, but even more notable for Joe because this was only the second time in more than 30 years that a boy had won this event. For some unknown reason, perhaps better coordination, more teen-age girls ride Saddle Horses than do boys of the same age (even though most professional riders are men) and seem, generally, to do a better job of it.

Young Joe accepted his victory with modest aplomb, but his mother's excitement was unrestrained. "When they called his number," she gasped later, "I got dizzy and everything went black. Then I started to whoop and clap; I forgot to act like a lady, but I don't think anybody around me cared, because by that time they all knew I was a mother."

The climactic event of the show was the world's championship five-gaited stake. For eight straight years the Dodge Stables' Wing Commander, with Earl Teater up, had won the award. This year the greatest show horse of all time was retired and the field was open. The Dodge Stables still had a strong candidate, a full sister to Wing Commander named Dream Waltz. Mr. and Mrs. Virgil Long's Shannondale, winner of the stake at the Kansas City Royal, presented powerful competition. Furthermore, the Dodge's trainer-rider Earl Teater was still grounded with a broken leg (SI, Oct. 31). His brother Lloyd was subbing for him, as well as showing his own customer's horses.

"It's hard work having champions," Lloyd Teater said before stake night. "Sometimes it's more fun just to have a stable of good winners. The pressure is not as bad—everybody isn't out to beat you—but I'll take the champions!"

Earl Teater couldn't agree with his brother more. "All those years that Wing Commander was undefeated—it got so everybody watched him all the time—he couldn't make a mistake, not even a little one. And he never did, but just before each class I'd wonder...."

Lloyd rode and drove to two championships—in the three-gaited stake with Thomas Corcoran's Emerald Future and the roadster stake with Mrs. Elizabeth Erickson's Senator Playboy—and then the five-gaited stake was on. Dream Waltz trotted and racked with brilliance and form, and when it was all over Lloyd accepted the ninth world's championship for the Dodge Stables. The Teater brothers again face a new year with that familiar feeling of showing champions.

The horses in the hunter and jumper divisions were not of the same high quality as those in the saddle and harness events, but here and there some good jumping was seen. The knock-down-and-out class, with a number of clean horses, was finally won by Donegal, owned and ridden by Miss Kay Allen of Columbus, Ohio. Two other noteworthy classes were the fine harness stake, won by Sunnyslope Farms' spectacular Lemon Drop Kid; and one of the finest junior five-gaited stakes seen in a long time, won by Sabre, a fast-moving chestnut gelding, ridden by Tuck Higgins.

In between these equine events, champions of other kinds had their turn in the limelight. At every performance some of the winning animals from the livestock exposition were paraded to the music of the Stock Yard Band. This band, composed of bagpipes and drums, its members nicely attired in kilts of Buchanan plaid, led the march of Santa Gertrudis cattle, prize-winning herds of other breeds and a $16,945 Aberdeen-Angus steer named Julius. The champion wether, an imposing sheep of 102 pounds, was towed around the ring in a special cage behind a jeep; but the grand-prize winner in the porcine class, a 204-pound barrow which was sold at a record price of $19.25 a pound, was not displayed. There was also an exhibition of sheep herding, and a demonstration of three teams of six Clydesdales, recalling the early days of the 56-year-old show when the draft horse played a major part in the horse shows held in conjunction with the Live Stock Exposition, the largest in the United States and perhaps in the world.

ILLUSTRATION

"Here's a handy new item he probably doesn't have. Waterproof playing cards and lead poker chips."

OTHER WINNERS

Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Bunn Jr. of Springfield, Ill. Their Sam Spade won ladies' five-gaited and amateur stake classes, their Blythe Spirit the bike stake and their Mastercraft Showman a class for ponies not exceeding 50 inches.

Miss Judy Bradshaw, Gray Summit, Mo. Her Mark of Success won junior three-gaited stake, amateur youth stake and ladies' three-gaited class.

Mr. J. L. Younghusband, Barrington, Ill. His Mr. America won stallion stake, A Rarity was winner in mare class.

Miss Sally Moeiing, Chicago. Her Sequoia won hunter championship.

Mr. and Mrs. John Wahl, Rockford, Ill. Their black pair King Solitude and King Solace won harness class for ponies not exceeding 50 inches as well as tandem event.

Dodge stables of Rochester, Mich. Their Cora's Mite and Little Charm won pair class for ponies between 12 and 14 hands and ladies' harness pony pair. The stable's Lexington division won mare stake and world's championship five-gaited stake with Dream Waltz.