From the Archive: "A Century of Heavy Horse Shows at the Calgary Stampede," by Bruce A. Roy
From the DHJ Archive | Originally published Summer 2012
By Bruce A. Roy
This article tracks the first century of the Stampede Heavy Horse Show, from 1912-2012. It was originally published in The Draft Horse Journal's Summer 2012 edition. In addition to announcing the Calgary Stampede show for many years (as pictured here), Bruce Roy's committee involvement with the show spans over 60 years.
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Draft horses have shown at Calgary’s Stampede for more than a century. They were shown at the Calgary Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale for close to five decades. While one can name draft horse shows in North America that have drawn larger entries, few have been more influential than those held at Calgary.
The Calgary Stampede’s 2011 Heavy Horse Show was a preview of Madison, Wisconsin’s 2011 World Clydesdale Show. Willow Way Jolie, Calgary’s Reserve Grand Champion Clydesdale Mare, was Madison’s World Champion Clydesdale Mare; Madison’s Reserve World Champion Clydesdale Mare, WV Greendykes Charismatic Finale, was Calgary’s Grand Champion Mare. While the Alberta-bred filly turned the tables on her Michigan-bred rival, the world’s best Clydesdales showed at Calgary before they faced each other at Madison. However, this is nothing new.
Willow Way Jolie, 2011 World Champion Clydesdale Mare and the Stampede's Reserve Champion. Photo by Kristen Wilkieson.
Philix was the Grand Champion Percheron Stallion at Chicago’s 1917 International Livestock Exposition. He topped over 300 Percheron stallions shown. Purchased by Layzell & Parr, a Calgary firm, on leaving the Chicago show ring, they were given a standing offer of $15,000 to return the big black sire to America. However, Layzell & Parr had other plans. An enthusiastic crowd gathered at Calgary’s 1918 Spring Horse Show to see the Chicago champion. The crowd expressed surprise when Philix placed second in class to Carnoise. Also shown at Chicago, Carnoise had placed sixth in the class Philix topped. Calgary’s ringside erupted like a volcano when Carnoise was named Grand Champion Percheron Stallion at Calgary’s 1918 Spring Horse Show. The surprise Layzell & Parr expressed turned to disappointment, for Carnoise defeated the honour-laden Philix in the short test. This dark horse was the Reserve Grand Champion Stallion.
Scenes such as these at the Calgary Stampede have captivated spectators for decades.
Pete Lippitt, winner of the Men's Pecheron cart class
at the 1983 Stampede.
Genesis
Canada’s Northwest Mounted Police constructed Fort Calgary in 1875. A frontier town grew around the fort following the Canadian Pacific Railway’s arrival in 1884, albeit this growth was slow. The Calgary Herald felt an Agricultural Society was needed to showcase what Canada’s Northwest Territories could produce.
The Territorial Council responded. Such a society might qualify for a $200 grant, as the federal government had set 94 acres aside for a fairgrounds. Calgarians responded, forming their Agricultural Society. The crown land was purchased for $2.50 an acre. However, the Agricultural Society had to guarantee the land purchased would never be subdivided.
Calgary held its first fair in 1886. Interest was evident. Classes for draft horses, blood horses and roadsters; for Durham cattle, other cattle, sheep, hogs, poultry, grain, roots, flowers, dairy produce, ladies’ work and farm implements were offered. Five hundred people attended the October event. However, Calgary’s Agricultural Society was plagued with financial problems. The 94 acres purchased reverted to the town; the Society’s $7,000 deficit was covered. Re-organized as the Western Pacific Exposition Co., the first Dominion Fair was held at Calgary in July, 1900.
The Western Pacific Exposition Co. organized a Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale in 1901. The classification offered draft horse breeders included breeding and performance classes. The spring event became a livestock showcase. Shorthorn, Hereford and Angus bulls shown were sold to settlers. They needed breeding stock. Draft horses were also in demand. They were needed in numbers to cultivate area homesteads. Rail cars, loaded with Clydesdale and Percheron stallions arrived for Calgary’s Spring Horse Show. Shown before the cosmopolitan horsemen in the region, cooperative stallion clubs formed to hire breeding stallions. Ranchers and farmers who bought stallions for their own use further sparked the trade.
Calgary’s Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale was a social event. It marked spring’s arrival. Attendance grew, as Calgary and the surrounding area was populated. Livestock organizations held meetings, staged banquets and held dances. The Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale offered needed entertainment. Residents, urban and rural, came to know each other and business increased.
In 1905, the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan were carved out of Canada’s Northwest Territories. Homesteaders started arriving in greater numbers. The demand for breeding stock continued to grow. So too, did Calgary’s Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale.
Alex Fleming piloting the Bar U Ranch Percheron six-up in 1916.
The high-selling Heavy Horse Team at the 1968 Stampede.
Calgary’s Spring Horse Show
By 1883, Clydesdales, the breed Scotch and Irish settlers favoured, were in Calgary’s foothills. Percherons came to the area in 1888 when George Lane brought two stallions and 38 mares from Montana. The fat was soon in the fire. The draft horse breed a rancher or farmer employed was a cause for much heated debate as the political party these pioneers supported. Clydesdales had the early advantage. Year after year, the judges at Calgary’s draft horse shows were Clydesdale men. They saw little in a Percheron they liked. Suffering as Percheron owners then did, Percheron supporters won the “Battle of the Breeds,” for the immigrants from the U.K., France, Russia, Poland, Denmark, etc., favoured the clean-legged Percheron.
Balbriggan Hero was one of the first Clydesdales shown at Calgary. John A. Turner & family of Calgary owned the tidy horse bred in Scotland. Balbriggan Hero arrived in Canada’s Northwest Territories in the 1890s. The Turners shipped Balbriggan Hero to Chicago’s 1893 World Columbian Exposition. Although he travelled the greatest distance of the North American Clydesdales shown, the Calgary champion managed a sixth placing in the 4-year-old stallion class, topped by Prince Patrick, the vision.
George Lane also made history. In 1902, in partnership with Gordon, Ironside & Fares, he purchased the North West Cattle Co.’s Bar U Ranch from the Allen family of steamship fame. Lane built the largest Percheron breeding operation ever known. In 1907, 1908 and 1909, Lane imported Percherons from France. His 1909 importation was the largest. The three stallions and 72 females, purportedly, cost $100,000 each.
Calgary’s Spring Horse Shows were supported by Lane, as were Calgary’s Dominion Fairs held in July. He set a high bar with his Percheron exhibits. The Bar U Percherons he showcased were walked from the Bar U Ranch to Cayley’s railhead. The halter horses were tied to the loaded show wagon that his hitch horses pulled. At Cayley, all was loaded onto rail cars. When the rail cars transporting the Bar U Percherons reached Calgary, they were shunted on to tracks that entered Calgary’s fairgrounds. Here the rail cars were positioned; the horses, show wagon and tack unloaded.
George Lane, and Gordon, Ironside & Fares, dominated the Percheron entries at Calgary’s Spring Horse Show. Epatant was Grand Champion Stallion in 1909, while the Grand Champion Mare was Gardienne. In 1910, Garou was Grand Champion Stallion. The imported female, Bichette, was a Grand Champion Mare on repeat occasions. These were Percherons Lane had bought in France.
Numbered among the ranch-bred Percherons that were Calgary Spring Horse Show champions were King George 5th, Lord Nelson, Marvel, Olbert and Oyama. Marvel succeeded at Halifax, his $3,000 sire, breeding Bar U Ranch mares, as did Olbert, whose sire was the Treacherous stallion, Americain. Lord Nelson sold this horse to the United States. He became an influential sire in Dakotas. A Japanese Prince bought Oyama for the government of Japan. King George 5th stayed in Alberta. He bred with success at High River.
The American cowboy, Guy Weadick, visited Calgary early in the 1900s. He promoted a tribute to Western Canada’s pioneers. The Directors of the Western Pacific Exhibition Co. were sold on his vision. They had Weadick stage his proposed Stampede. This was held at Calgary’s 1908 Dominion Fair. An overwhelming success, $13,000 in prize money was paid to livestock exhibitors, this was the largest purse yet offered.
The 1995 winning Light Belgian Team, driven by Brian Coleman.
Calgary’s Industrial Exhibition
The financial success of Calgary’s 1908 Dominion Fair sparked further progress. When the Industrial Building was constructed, Calgary’s 25,000 residents felt a name change was needed—one that reflected civic progress. Hence, in 1910, the Western Pacific Exposition Co. became the Calgary Industrial Exhibition Co. Ltd. The wooden arena, seating 3,000 spectators, was constructed in 1911. Called the Victoria Pavilion, this structure became the venue for the livestock show at Calgary’s Spring Horse Show and Calgary’s Industrial Exhibition.
In 1912, the Canadian Pacific Railway’s Calgary livestock agent contacted Guy Weadick inquiring if he had produced a show titled “The Last Best West.” The American cowboy responded that he needed $100,000 to stage the production. Four local ranchers—George Lane, Pat Burns, A.E. Cross and Archie McLean—financed Weadick’s show. Each member of the “Big Four” wrote the Calgary Industrial Exhibition Company a $25,000 cheque. The 1912 Calgary Stampede was held in September, two months after Calgary’s Industrial Exhibition. The Duke of Connaught, Canada’s Governor General, attended with Princess Patricia, his daughter. The Calgary Stampede’s first street parade drew 80,000 spectators, surpassing Calgary’s population.
Jureur, the French-bred Junior Champion Stallion at Chicago’s 1911 International Livestock Exposition, arrived in Alberta weeks after his win, with Janette, Chicago’s Junior Champion Mare. J.C. Drewry of Cowley had purchased the Percheron pair. A man of vision and wealth, Drewry was a leader who promoted Alberta as the Kentucky of Canada. Percheron and Thoroughbred horses were bred on his Glen Ranch.
In 1912, Jureur was Grand Champion Percheron Stallion at Calgary’s Spring Horse Show and at Calgary’s Exhibition and Stampede. More important, he caught the eye of Hardy E. Salter, a young Englishman then employed at the Cochrane Horse Ranch. Salter had never laid eyes on a horse like Jureur.
During World War I the Calgary Stampede was cancelled. The Spring Horse Show and Industrial Exhibition continued to operate. Both events were vital to Canada’s war effort. The battlefields of France were in desperate need of draft horses. Shipped overseas in record numbers, Canadian-bred draft horses moved the heavy guns and transported needed supplies to the army. One year during World War I, The Farm and Ranch Review reported: “There must have been about $50,000 worth of horses sold at the Calgary Spring Show. George Lane had at least $10,000 worth booked before the end of the week.”
The Burns six-horse hitch participating in
the Stampede street parade, circa 1946.
The Victory Stampede
Canada paid a heavy price fighting in World War I. The war’s end was cause for celebration. Weadick was called upon to organize a 1919 Victory Stampede. This event’s success guaranteed the Calgary Stampede’s future. The Exhibition and Stampede were combined. Calgary’s first Industrial Exhibition and Stampede was held in 1923.
Lane shipped 26 Percheron mares and a stallion to England in 1918. In 1919, a second Percheron shipment followed. It contained 53 head of Percherons, including two stallions—Paragon and Perfection. Paragon was Reserve Champion Canadian-Bred Percheron Stallion at Calgary’s 1919 Industrial Exhibition. Perfection had placed second in Paragon’s class. Shown at the Royal Show upon arriving in England, the tables were turned. Perfection won his class; Paragon stood second. The Bar U Percherons are cornerstones of today’s British Percheron breed.
A.E. Cross and Archie McLean saw little in Lane’s Percherons they liked. Informed the Clydesdale Horse Association of Canada was awarding the Watson Challenge Shield at Calgary’s 1926 Spring Horse Show to the Champion Canadian-bred Clydesdale Stallion, both Scotsmen were elated. This magnificent trophy was offered in Captain Geoffrey L. Watson’s memory. The former owner of Westholme Mains on Vancouver Island, Watson gave his life in 1915 fighting for Canada. The perpetual trophy remains a Clydesdale icon.
John Prowse of Cluny was the first Albertan to lift this trophy. His winner, Nonpareil Lad, was a Clydesdale stallion he bred, raised and exhibited. The five-year-old bay, marked picture-perfect, was a Craigie Blend son. Percheron breeders seen ringside for the trophy presentation wore long faces. Their Percheron breed offered no trophy that could match that Prowse had won.
Twice more Albertans lifted the Watson Challenge Shield at Calgary’s Spring Horse Show. In 1926 Dawson Turner of Calgary won with Hillcrest Favourite, a Saskatchewan-bred son of The Bruce; while Baron of Willowdale, a Baron Blackwood son shown by A. Webster & Son of Airdrie, lifted the handsome trophy in 1932. Since 1949 the Watson Challenge Shield has been awarded at Toronto’s Royal Agricultural Winter Fair.
One of the Clydesdale stalwarts at Calgary during these years was Professor William J. Carlyle. He managed the E.P. Ranch for Edward, Prince of Wales. This respected stockman, an Ontario Agricultural College graduate, had served that institution as an instructor. Hired by the University of Minnesota as an Extension Lecturer, he became Professor of Animal Husbandry at Colorado’s Agricultural College.
Professor Carlyle often spoke for Clydesdale breeders at Calgary, where Percheron breeders were certain he was abetted by fellow Scot Ernie L. Richardson, the popular General Manager of the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede. Professor Carlyle’s portrait was hung in Chicago’s Saddle and Sirloin Club. He brought many name Clydesdales to the E.P. Ranch from the British Isles, the stallions Crusader and Baron Blackwood included. The best Clydesdale female Carlyle imported was Balcairn Ringlet, a beautiful filly, her underpinning was well furnished with a wealth of silky, straight hair.
Co-Op Milk Company of Calgary was an early exhibitor and
supporter of the Stampede Heavy Horse Show.
The Chuckwagon Race
When Pat Burns helped finance Calgary’s 1912 Stampede, the Irish cattleman owned six Alberta ranches stocked with 1,600 horses. He also founded Burns & Co., one of the world’s largest meat packers.
Burns & Co. first employed Percherons on Calgary’s streets. However, the Burns Ranches bred Clydesdales. The Clydesdales replaced the Percherons following World War I. Like the great meat packers then in Chicago—Morris, Armour, Swift, Wilson & Co.—Burns & Co. assembled an exhibition six-horse hitch to promote their Calgary packing plant. To ensure the advertisement sought was positive, Burns had Archie Currie wheel the exhibition hitch. This Calgary teamster served him well.
Spring and summer, Calgarians packed Victoria Pavilion to watch Burns & Co.’s black Clydesdales perform. The wooden structure trembled when they hit the show ring, all six Clydesdales on the gallop. Archie Currie rivaled Alex Fleming as a teamster. Fleming had long been a hero in the area when he wheeled the Bar U Ranch’s Percheron hitch, his bull whip in one hand, six lines in the other. Fleming’s schooled Percherons responded. However, fellow teamsters were not impressed. Often they lost control of their own horses when Fleming cracked his whip. Heated conversations often followed a class.
While great friends, Burns and Lane were rivals. Horsemen were of the opinion the two ranchers had a wager late in the 1800s. Purportedly Lane boasted his Percherons could pull a loaded chuckwagon a given distance on the range faster than the Clydesdales Burns employed could. Was there such a wager? If so, who won? And where did this race take place? We will never know, for the breed-biased horsemen who once spoke of this wager are dead. But the question lingers. Did the purported wager a century past give birth to the Calgary Stampede’s world famous Chuckwagon Races?
George Lane was a community man. His Bar U Percheron Hitch appeared in countless Stampede Parades. Often Lane’s Percherons were employed pulling community floats. On one occasion he was approached by a group of Calgary ladies. They asked Lane if he had a Percheron hitch to pull their float. Lane said yes, if he could advertise the Bar U Percherons with a banner on the float’s two sides. The ladies had no problem with this.
The float was well received in the parade. To the ladies’ delight, spectators cheered, clapped and laughed as the float passed by. However, shock was manifest when the parade ended. The banner Lane’s crew had attached to the float’s two sides, after the ladies were all aboard, read: “All bred by George Lane!”
Burns bought the Bar U Ranch following Lane’s death in 1926. Bar U’s Percheron mares were bred to Clydesdale stallions. Percheron breeders were upset, none more than Hardy E. Salter. Wounded in the Battle of the Somme, Salter returned to Canada after the Great War. He bred Percherons on a farm purchased at Carstairs. When Alberta’s Percheron Club elected him Secretary in 1929, he sold the farm. His Percheron horses were stabled in a barn on the grounds of Calgary’s Exhibition and Stampede. Here they remained for years. From this Calgary base, Salter marketed Percherons for Alberta Percheron Club members for a commission. The leased barn became a hub of breed activity.
Clydesdale breeders considered Salter a thorn in their side. His weekly columns in Calgary’s Market Examiner were filled with Percheron propaganda. Nonetheless, Clydesdales continued to dominate the performance classes at Calgary, although Percheron entries increased in number at the Spring Show and Exhibition and Stampede.
Thanks to Salter, the Percheron exhibits were followed with interest in the 1930s. Stampede was the Grand Champion Percheron Stallion at Calgary’s Spring Horse Show for several years. He was shown by Greenway & Clark of Acme, who also owned Ebony Rose. Summer following summer, Ebony Rose was the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede’s Grand Champion Percheron Mare. Stampede was seldom shown at the Exhibition and Stampede. He was busy breeding hundreds of mares across Alberta. Ebony Rose was seldom seen at Calgary’s Spring Show.
The fertile female was at home nursing a foal. However, when Greenway & Clark fielded their Percheron hitch in July, Curtis Clark, lines in hand, had Ebony Rose positioned on the left wheel.
Eddie Frietag with Loretta Lou, the 1976 Grand Champion Belgian Mare
at the Stampede.
Willow Way Lana, 1992 Champion Clyde Mare,
for the Gordeykos.
Rose Hill Carolyn, Grand Champion Percheron Mare in 1994,
for Gory Ruzicka.
Gentle Giant Lucky Choice, 1994 & 1995 Champion Shire Mare,
for Keith Gibson.
World War II
In September, 1939 Canada entered World War II. However, at the Calgary Spring Horse Show and Bull Sale and at the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede, it was business as usual. While the largest oil field in the British Empire was located near Calgary, gas and oil were rationed. Draft horse prices soared. Several Calgary oilmen became draft horse breeders. Few were more colourful than H.R. McConachie.
Roy J. Widney of Turner Valley brought his blue roan mare, Blue Babe, to Calgary’s 1941 Spring Horse Show. Following her arrival, she foaled a horse colt. Hivu Chief Laet, the colt’s sire, was Reserve Grand Champion Percheron Stallion. Blue Babe was third in her class. Salter capitalized on these events. Hivu Chief Laet was paraded with Blue Babe and their foal at the evening performance show. He reported the 4,500 spectators in Victoria Pavilion expressed pleasure when the colt, but days old, started to stretch his legs. The foal so enjoyed his freedom, horsemen failed to coax him from the ring. They had to corner him, sparking gales of laughter, before carrying him from the arena. Salter had ensured the presence of reporters and the next morning every Calgary newspaper carried an account of the foal’s antics.
Belgian, Clydesdale and Percheron hitches were shown at Calgary, spring and summer during the ’30s and ’40s. Competition was fast, each teamster had his fans. Burns & Co. of Calgary; Bob Allan of Dalroy; J.W. Monroe of Carstairs; Charlie Gordon of Carstairs; Burns & Rye of Edmonton; George Leask of Madden; Allan C. Leslie of Watrous, Saskatchewan; Eddie Arnold of Shoal Lake, Manitoba; the Union Milk Company of Calgary; L.O. Crockett of Mayerthorpe; Greenway & Clark of Acme; the V-Bar-V Ranch of Aitken; and Calgary’s Cooperative Milk Company fielded Percherons. Two Saskatchewan breeders fielded Belgians: Dr. H.E. Alexander of Saskatoon and Bob Thomas of Grandora.
Following World War II, mechanization replaced draft horses. Heavy horses were shown a last time at Calgary’s 1946 Spring Horse Show. This event folded a few years later. Without the presence of Belgians, Clydesdales and Percherons, public interest in the Spring Horse Show fell away. The Winter Fairs at Saskatoon and Regina, plus Edmonton’s Spring Show, followed suit. Only Brandon’s Winter Fair survived. It continues to showcase draft horses each spring.
When horses were no longer employed on Calgary’s streets, Burns & Co., Union Milk and Co-op Milk Co. gave their show wagons to the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede. They were stored with the Yukon Stage and a handsome coach, drawn by four horses, in a structure below Scotchman’s Hill.
These horse-drawn vehicles always appeared in the Stampede Parade. Stampede Directors and their wives led the Stampede Parade, seated in and atop the coach. Hardy Salter ensured Percheron horses were the four-in-hand. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip were delivered to the infield in 1959 in this coach for a command performance of Calgary’s Stampede. Four Percherons, held in hand by George Church, a Stampede Director, ensured the royal couple’s safe arrival. They were welcomed by thousands of school kids from across Southern Alberta. Sadly, these historic vehicles were lost in a fire.
The Calgary Exhibition and Stampede constructed the] Agricultural Pavilion in 1956. The Victoria Pavilion was torn down. The new livestock pavilion was designed to house cattle, sheep and swine. The draft horses remained in the vintage barns across the street from the Corral’s east end. Here an outdoor show ring was constructed, which became the venue for halter classes. Given area traffic, it was far from ideal. At one Stampede, Ringling, Barnum & Bailey’s circus elephants started sounding off as they were watered outside the Corral’s east end. Horsemen had a difficult time showing their spooked horses. Performance classes were held in the infield, before the old grandstand.
While entry numbers fell, the draft horses shown at Calgary were of impressive quality. However, there was a pressing need of a facility where these exhibits could be properly showcased to the public. Needless to suggest, several incidents occurred.
On one occasion, Rudolf Freitag of Alameda, Saskatchewan, exhibited a Belgian six-horse hitch in the infield. While driving before the grandstand, his Belgians took off. Freitag’s son, Eddie, then a teenager, had the lines in hand. He kept his cool and staged a performance few present will ever forget. He wheeled the six galloping Belgians from the infield and down the racetrack. When the horses tired and started to slow, Eddie forced them to run on, until they had circled the racetrack. Returning to the infield, Eddie brought his Belgians down to a trot, completing the class. No chuckwagon race excited spectators seated in the grandstand as did the runaway of the Freitag family’s six Belgians.
To enter the infield, hitches had to pass through a narrow alley that ended between the chutes. Pens filled with rodeo stock lined this alley. One year, officials failed to inform teamsters one pen contained buffalo. When Lawrence Rye’s lead team saw the buffalo, they spooked. The Clydesdale team jack-knifed in the narrow alley. Elmer Rye, their teamster, lost control. Panicked, the lead team dragged the swing horses around behind them. What could have been a frightful wreck was prevented by Stewart Roffey. Riding shotgun, he reached out and caught a line on the bridle of the lead horse passing beside him. He brought all six Clydesdales to a halt, which was lucky, for several hitches were in the alley, close behind the Rye Hitch.
Lawrence Rye & Son exhibited Clydesdales at Calgary for sixty-some years. Rudolf Freitag, his sons, Eddie and Hubert, and his grandson, Aaron, have shown at Calgary’s Heavy Horse Shows for more than 50 years.
Wareing Shires, Blackfoot, Idaho, took top honors in the Tandem in 1998.
The Crisis Years
Late in the 1960s, the heavy horse show at Calgary’s Exhibition and Stampede was in jeopardy. However, two Board members took issue with fellow Directors. The foresight of Edward and Angus McKinnon prevailed. These two ranchers knew the draft horse breeds shown at the show were needed to produce the big athletic broncs key to the Calgary Stampede’s success.
When the vintage barns were torn down, the draft horses were stabled in the livestock pavilion. When the old grandstand was demolished, performance classes moved to Revelstoke Acres. Year-after-year, halter classes were shown at different times and at different locations. While the public was not amused, the exhibits once again brought spectators in number to the stables and show rings. Problems of logistics were rectified, in part, when the Big Top was erected. While Calgary’s heavy horse show grew in stature, these chaotic years gave birth to stories veteran exhibitors still share.
In 1971, the performance classes were shown before the old grandstand. Continuous days of rain turned the infield into a swamp. Mud was knee-deep—so deep that Harold Clark, the judge from Michigan, couldn’t walk. Dick Cosgrave, the Stampede’s Arena Director, offered Clark his saddle horse. The previous year’s winner, the Donamerr Hitch shown by Don and Pam Tribbling of Uxbridge, Ontario, was one of the entries. This Percheron stable’s hitch horses were appointed with a new harness of black patent leather. Metal fittings were nickel chrome. This costly hand-made harness made its public debut in the mire of Calgary’s infield.
Slop flew as turnouts wheeled about the infield. The mud pulled shoe after shoe off hitch horses. When they left the Calgary infield, teamsters, horses, harness and equipment were covered with mud. It was a sad sight. Rightfully, exhibitors were disgusted. The Tribblings’ Percherons, still harnessed, were led to the wash racks in the livestock pavilion. Here men, horses and harness, were showered with hot water. Each part of the Donamerr show harness was separated, then washed piece-by-piece. The crew’s effort was spartan. Years later, when this Donamerr harness was sold, sand from Calgary’s infield would surface from cracks between layers of leather that were stitched together.
On one occasion, Stampede officials failed to assign heavy horsemen an area for exercising their horses. To address their concern, the Thoroughbreds that worked out each morning were ordered off the track by 9:00 a.m. Draft horse breeders had access to the track until 10:00 a.m. The jockeys failed to heed the order. When a single Belgian on a light wagon started circling the track, jockeys parted company with their mounts, one after another. Their language was coloured as they got on their feet. All hell had broken loose.
World Percheron Congress
In 1979, while in England, Earl James, Bill Lucas and Norman Wold won a bid they made on behalf of the Alberta Percheron Club. The World Percheron Congress, the first ever in North America, was held at the 1983 Calgary Exhibition and Stampede. Alberta horsemen and Stampede officials achieved stellar success. Three TV channels filmed the Stampede Parade. The Percheron breed’s kaleidoscopic entries received overwhelming coverage. Mickey and Minnie Mouse, seen on Disney World’s eight-horse Percheron Hitch, wowed young and old alike. Visitors from Australia, Britain, France and Japan joined Canadian and American Percheron enthusiasts to watch the parade before attending the Congress at Stampede Park. Judge Brian Stevenson of Calgary spoke at the Congress luncheon. He had everyone in stitches. The banquet acknowledged Percheron breeders across Canada, Calgary’s George Lane and Hardy E. Salter included.
The class for three Percherons, Get of One Sire, was without precedent. Sixteen North American entries came centre-ring. Offspring sons of Justamere Showtime sired, placed 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 8th and 9th in the class. Offspring of a grandson stood 4th, while Justamere Showtime’s offspring were 5th and 7th. Jonathon Fox III of Lloydminster, the breeder of Justamere Showtime, was elated. Two Ontario entries—Confetti, shown by the Kemp Bros. of Renfrew; and Blackhome Connie Lyn, shown by Reg M. Black of Moorefield—were named World Champion Stallion and Mare. Chief, shown by Don Swanston of High River, was World Champion Gelding. Harold Schumacher of Minnesota had World Champion Six-Horse Hitch; while the World Champion Eight-Horse Hitch was shown by Disney World from Florida. All told, 67 exhibitors from across North America contested the honours. The Calgary Exhibition and Stampede set a high bar for each World Percheron Congress held in North America since. This included Calgary’s 1998 Congress, which was held in the Saddledome.
Following the 1998 World Percheron Congress, Rod McBride, one of the Exhibition and Stampede’s Directors, called on the Heavy Horse Committee to brainstorm. He felt a world class heavy horse show at Calgary would bring spectators in record number if the Saddledome showcased the entry. Committee members responded. It was suggested Calgary be the venue for a World Six-Horse Hitch Championship, with rousing background music provided by members of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra. This would be a first, not only in North America, but for the equine world. Today, spectators come to Calgary from around the world to attend the Stampede, together with its now well-known heavy horse show. The best-known six-horse hitches in North America have contested Calgary’s honours. Percherons fielded by Cape Cod Finished Wood Siding of Nova Scotia; Jackson Fork Ranch of Wyoming; and Gray Transportation of Iowa; Clydesdales fielded by Carson Farms and Auction Services of Ontario; Express Ranches of Oklahoma; the Rocky Bar Belgians from Saskatchewan; and the Wareing Family Shires from Idaho, included. Attendance at the Calgary Stampede’s Heavy Horse Show has increased each year. However, Calgary’s Stampede offers much more.
Purportedly, many of the broncs bred at the Stampede Ranch descend from a Shire stallion that the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede purchased when the organization’s bronc breeding program was first started. It was said Marden Jupiter appeared in the background of this Shire stallion. Likely this was true, for horsemen in America’s Pacific Northwest had purchased many Alberta-bred Shires in the 1930s. Marden Jupiter was one of the five celebrated Shires King George V had presented to Agriculture Canada on behalf of The Shire Horse Society. Agriculture Canada had placed the imported English-bred Shires in Alberta, at Lacombe’s Federal Experimental Farm.
Following his arrival in Alberta, Marden Jupiter was shipped to Chicago. Shown at the 1924 International Livestock Exposition, he was Grand Champion Stallion. Chicago’s judge stated Marden Jupiter was the best Shire ever seen in America. Horsemen gathered ringside shared his opinion.
Shown at Calgary’s 1925 Spring Horse Show, Marden Jupiter was Grand Champion Shire Stallion. The 2,485 lb. athlete made an impression few spectators forgot. To the crowd’s delight, the ringman had Marden Jupiter circle the Victoria Pavilion’s show ring five times. The powerful stallion moved like a Hackney as he lifted his knees and flexed his hocks. The more Calgary’s crowd cheered, the more rousing was Marden Jupiter’s performance. When Marden Jupiter finally left the ring, spectators were standing, cheering and yelling.
The bucking broncs at the Stampede exhibit traits seen in draft horses. Midnight, long considered the greatest bronc to buck at Calgary, was by a Percheron stallion and out of an ill-tempered Thoroughbred mare. Clydesdale, Belgian and Percheron breeding is manifest in the broncs today’s stock contractors field at the Calgary Stampede.
Horses play a lead role at the Calgary Stampede. First shown at the Calgary Fair, heavy horses were shown at every Dominion Fair, Calgary Industrial Exhibition, Calgary Industrial Exhibition and Stampede, Calgary Exhibition and Stampede held since. They continue to appear at the Calgary Stampede and in each Stampede Parade. Stabled in the livestock Pavilion, their very presence sparks spectators’ excitement, whether they are being shod, showered, decorated, harnessed or hooked. Calgary’s public appetite for draft horses has never been satiated.
