As you know, the 2006 Celebration was cancelled on September 2nd without naming a World Grand Champion, due to only three horses passing their soundness inspection. The cancellation of the Celebration has brought the fact that widespread soring of performance horses truly does go on still today and this has generated welcomed national exposure. No longer can performance horse owners ignore the topic of soring their horses and pretend it doesn’t go on.
I would just like to say that I am SO HAPPY for the Tennessee Walking Horse! The breed has endured so many different kinds of abuse, speculation, horrid publicity, and misunderstandings about training and showing for decades. I am so relieved that the festering boil that has been on this beloved breed has been lanced! Now we can get on with what the breed is truly all about – wonderful, good-minded horses who are the ultimate smooth, sensible, and safe pleasure horses.
I am sorry for all the innocent people who have been hurt financially by the cancellation of the Celebration, but we need to clean up this industry and this exposure is a start. I am so tired of having to defend my ownership of Tennessee Walking Horses to others. Whenever I am at another breed show, function, clinic, etc., I am asked what type of horses I have. When I say the Tennessee Walking Horse, the response is always the same, “Oh, you mean those horses that get abused!” I am tired of having to explain all the differences in the breed with regards to showing, training, or usage of the breed.
Why should this horse have such a dark cloud over it? It isn’t the horse’s fault, it is ours! So now it is time to cleanse this breed from the inside out. I request to all those sound horse lovers, owners, breeders, trainers, and anyone else who wants to see this long road of suffering end, do the following:
•Breed your sound mare to a proven sound stallion
•Put your horse in training with a proven sound trainer
•Support only those associations who support the sound horse
•Give your financial support to those who are making a stand for the sound horse
•Send your letters and comments of support to our government leaders
•Give thanks those who have been fighting the good fight for so long
I would also like to say that I feel the time is now for all of the Sound Horse Groups to come together. Let us stop fighting and get to the heart of what we all want and desire. We all want the same thing…a sound walking horse without all the negative rebukes and persecution and to be able to show the world that this horse has truly been wrongly perceived, not because of the horse but because of the people owning and training the horses!
I look forward to a new future for the Tennessee Walking Horse. How exciting it is for all of us sound horse supporters that our dream has just started to come true! Now is the time to work together to rebuild this industry the way it was meant to be. I am ever so excited about what tomorrow will hold for all of us.
Lonnie Kuehn
Sound Horse Associations:
