The story of "Gusty Wind"

Often people say to me "I see why your place is called 'Gusty Wind' the wind is so strong up here. I almost always answer "Well the name Gusty Wind is certainly appropriate, however our placed was not named because of the wind we get up here. It was named in honor of a horse my mother used to have."

The story goes like this. My mother was raised in suburban Baltimore, MD. Her family had cats, a dogs, a bunny rabbit, and white rats, but horses where far from their minds. That is everyone's mind except for hers. She thought about horses most of the time.

When she was in seventh grade, in January 1958 a friend of hers named Ruth took my mother and another friend named Bobbi to Rolling Road stable for a birthday party. Ruth and Bobby had been taking riding lessons with their girl scout troup so my mother's parents thought it would be ok for her to attend the party since the other girls knew how to "ride" (they had taken about 6-12 riding lessons). So Ruth's parents rented each girl a horse. Since mother didn't have any problems at the party her parents felt assured that it would be safe for her to go riding with Ruth again. She started going riding as often as mother could save up the money to rent a horse. She was probably riding once every 2-3 weeks and certainly every day off from school was used to go riding. Ruth was giving mother second hand riding lessons. The second time she went riding Ruth told her how to post. Out in the field they where trotting along and mother's horse broke into a canter. Her friend Ruth said "You where cantering!" Mother said "I wonder why I couldn't post to it". Ruth said "You don't post to a canter". Mom said "Oh".

Once school was out for the summer Rolling Road had a special 13 week course of riding lessons. The package was cheaper than buying the lessons individually so her parents agreed to let her take the lessons. Mother saved up her money and then took the lessons. After the thirteen week course was getting close to being finished mother wanted to continue to take more lessons, but would have had to struggle to pay for more lessons. Her father seeing that she was very interested offered to pay for 1/2 f her lessons. That arrangement continued for the entire duration of the time she continued to take lessons.

As time progressed her riding got better and better. After about three years her teacher Mrs. Williams called my mother's mom up on the telephone and said that Mother "probably didn't have as much natural ability as some of the others but that Arlene makes up for it in hard work" She also told her that the only way mother could continue to improve her riding skills was if mother had her own horse. Mother was not aware that Mrs. Williams had called the house. That was in mother's eleventh grade year. That year when mother made her Christmas list up she only put one thing on it "Gus". Gus was a 14.2 hand six year old Arabian gelding that mother rode for riding lessons. He was originally brought into the stable for another person but that did not work out. That year mother got on the president's list which meant she had straight A's in academic classes (the hardest classes she could sign up for). Her father was so pleased with her grades that he wanted to reward her. So, after viewing her Christmas list and much careful consideration, he went out to the stable and purchased Gus. He purchased Gus on the December 22 but told the owners that he wanted mother to get to ride Gus but to keep it a secret that her father had purchased him. So Mr. Cauliflower the stable owner told mother that he wanted her to ride Gus during Christmas break since she would have a lot of extra time. So she didn't suspect anything and rode him when she was out at the stable before Christmas. Before Christmas as she groomed him she thought to herself "I don't know why I'm doing this, he'll never be mine" but she did it because she "just liked him".

So as mother says "Daddy made three copies of the bill of sale Christmas when he handed out the presents the last things he handed out where three copies of the bill of sale one to my brother, one to my sister, and lastly one to me". So technically Gus was given to all three children but mother was the only one who knew how to ride. She says "I couldn't believe my eyes. I gave my father a big hug and we went out to the stable to see Gus".

She and her friends tried to choose a "show name" for Gus. Her friend Sue, suggested "Gusty Wind". Since mom thought that was the best suggestion she decided on "Gusty Wind" for his "real" or "show" name but always called him Gus when he was not showing.

Gus had a lot of talent. Mother showed him for years in open jumper. He jumped and won at 4 feet. He never touched a jump because he thought it was scary to hit his feet on those jumps. She also fox hunted him one time. He jumped every jump and was in outstanding physical condition. He did so well that the hunt staff kept inviting him to move up farther in the hunt.