Tuesday, January 9, 2024

The Seven Mustangs of Rancho Randado

 Salvete Omnes,



a little bit of mustangs lorein this post and some Dobie's storytelling & A. P. Proctor's sculpting - from Texas
Frank Dobie in his book 'The mustangs' wrote the following:

''When A. Phimister Proctor [famous American sculptor] was commissioned in 1939 to make a bronze statue of a group of authentic mustangs - the sculpture called The Seven Mustangs, presented to the people of Texas by Mr. and Mrs. Ralph D. Ogden of Austin, unveiled on the campus of the University of Texas in 1948 -  the only Spanish horses in Texas available for models [...]were owned by Tom T. East in his San Antonio Viejo ranch in the brush border country. He had around 250 head of dun and grullo horses, all line-backed. They were descendants from a dun mustang stallion caught when about ten years old on the Rancho Randado. In 1920 Tom East got a grullo stallion, son of the dun, and began breeding him to a few mare that were puro Espanol. In the course of years he found that no matter what color of a stallion bred to dun mares, ninety per cent of the colts were dun. [...]The Randado used to raise about the best Spanish horses in Texas. It was a horse ranch, established late in the 18th century.[...] It was fitting that A. Phimister  Proctor's mustangs, plunging forever in bronze, should, while representing all Spanish horses, have been modeled upon coyote duns out of the Rancho Randado.''



Book is available for borrowing from the Archive, world library.



enjoy

Valete

No comments: