Soapweed
Well-known member
AN INTERESTING AUCTION 40 YEARS AGO
By Steve Moreland, September 19, 2018
For many years I was a regular subscriber to THE DRAFT HORSE JOURNAL, billed as: "The World's Foremost Heavy Horse and Mule Publication." The magazine was started in 1964, was published quarterly, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading each issue from cover to cover. The Summer 1978 issue contained an ad that was intriguing and irresistibly appealing. This full-page advertisement read as follows:
THE DATE OF THE HARLAN McCOY CLYDESDALE AND SHIRE DISPERSAL HAS BEEN CHANGED TO: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1978. At 9:00 a.m. Mountain Time on the Rodeo Grounds at the north edge of Faith, South Dakota, harness and equipment at 9:00 a.m. Start on the horses at noon sharp.
HORSES: 50 BROOD MARES…ages 4 to 13. Half of these mares are black with white marking—several bays with white markings, some roans and grays. These mares are in range condition and will go out and do for you. They have never been babied, some of them have never had grain. So if you give them grass and water, they will do for you. They have been good to me. They have the cow-calf deal beat 2 to 1.
FOUR BLACK HERD SIRES, with all white feet and faces, from 4 to 9 years of age. They have never been babied and run out all the time.
25 SUCKING COLTS…about half of them will be black with white markings.
30 YEARLINGS…about half of them are black. The stud colts have not been castrated. There will be some good enough for studs.
20 TWO-YEAR-OLD COLTS…some of these will be good enough for studs. There will also be a few good broke saddle horses and some broke teams in harness. This is the result of 60 years of constructive breeding and raising Clyde and Shire horses.
Our motto has always been:
QUALITY IS LONG REMEMBERED AFTER THE PRICE IS FORGOTTEN.
These horses will have a clean health sheet and can go anywhere.
HARNESSES AND RELATED EQUIPMENT: 30 sets of Good Work Harness. 2 sets of World War I U.S. Army Harness. 1 set of Show Harness, 3 strap breeching, real nice. Some Driving Harness, single and double. 75 Good Collars. 1 running W. One ton of harness, ring spreaders, buckles, snap rings, copper rivets, etc. A lot of rope for halters, throw ropes, some for Scotch hobbles and numerous halters. Several hames in pairs. 2 sets of Chrome Hames, real nice. Speculum for floating teeth. Harness tools. Stitching horse. 20 pairs of good old spurs, Crocketts, Kellys, Mexican, one pair of all silver. 2 pair of Cavalry spurs. 2 pair Eagle Cavalry rosettes. Several old bits, Crockets, Kellys, handmade, and some U.S. Army bits. Sleigh bells.
HORSE DRAWN MACHINERY AND EQUIPMENT: 3 High wheeled triple box wagons, good, solid, some with original paint. Several buggies, buckboards, bobsleds, sleighs, cutters. Doubletrees for wagons and buggies. Neck Yokes. 1 set of Old Stage Coach Doubletrees. Wagon tongues. Shafts. Plows. Cultivators. Manure Spreaders. Mowers and mower parts. Sickles and sickle sections for horse mowers. Pitman sticks. 1 Chickashaw Stock Trailer 16' x 6', year old, like new.
AND SADDLES…Side Saddles, English, U.S. Cavalry. There is going to be a fine display of good old saddles, Hamleys, N. Porters, E.C. Lee, Cogshalls, Duhamels, Frasers, etc.
AND HORSESHOES…500 pair, all sizes, will be sold in pairs.
ANTIQUES, GUNS, AND MISCELLANEOUS
As they say, "too numerous to mention." The guns include Winchesters, Remingtons, Smith and Wessons, Colts, gun racks, and holsters.
Buffalo fur coat, buffalo heads, horns, canes, robes, horse blankets, etc.
Old wood burning stoves, ranges, and heaters: Warm Morning, Round Oak, Majestic Ranges, Copper Clad, Copper Boilers, etc….branding irons and cream separators.
MUST SEE TO APPRECIATE…FAR TOO MUCH TO LIST HERE.
AUCTIONEERS: Jack Cambell, Douglas, Wyoming. Stanley Christenson, Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Dick Stene, Beresford, South Dakota. Kenny McCoy, Ramona, California
Lunch available on grounds…Impossible to adequately describe. There has never been a sale quite like it.
At this time, I must interject that the part about "lunch available on grounds" turned out to be false advertising, but more about that later.
In the summer of 1978, when this advertisement came out, I was 26 years old and completely inspired by this fantastic upcoming auction. Wild horses couldn't have kept me home that day, even though I lived nearly 200 miles away. I was dating Carol McCrory, my wife-to-be, and I tried to talk her into going to the sale with me. She would have loved to go to enjoy the day, but she was working on finishing her last year of nursing school in Scottsbluff. I tried to find someone to go with me to that September sale, but didn't get any takers.
I arose way before daylight on that fabulous Friday, and left my home on Dad's Green Valley Hereford Ranch northeast of Merriman, Nebraska at 4:00 a.m. I whipped and spurred my 1974 Chevrolet half-ton pickup, and arrived in Philip ahead of 6:00 a.m. for breakfast at a restaurant. I'd have eaten even heartier had I known it would be after 8:00 p.m.—14 hours later—when I would next have anything to eat, and it would be at this same restaurant.
Another hour and a half and 82 miles later I arrived at the rodeo arena in Faith. The fairgrounds were filling up fast with people, and lots of parked cars displayed licenses from many states and Canadian provinces. The weather was beautiful, sunny and mild, with a light breeze. All seemed to be in order, but the sale didn't start quite as early as advertised. It seems that the head honcho, Harlan McCoy, was not present to give the go-ahead. About thirty minutes later, he pulled in with a truckload of horses. He had been hauling horses from the Pierre area, and had been driving most of the night.
The horses that would be offered for sale were in a pasture not too far from the arena. It was a stirring sight to see several cowboys rounding up the big herd of range horses that had "never been babied." Downright wild and bronky, with a few cockleburs decorating manes and tails, could also be a descriptive appropriate phrase in describing the Clydesdales and Shires that would soon be selling.
The antiques and collectible western memorabilia definitely lived up to expectations. This time period in the late 1970's was booming. Land prices were skyrocketing, and livestock was selling at all-time highs. Conditions would change drastically in a few short years, but euphoria ruled the day. Harlan McCoy's timing for the sale of his lifetime accumulation of collectibles and draft horses couldn't have been better. Helping to sell work horses was the fact that gas was both scarce and expensive. This was in the time period of long lines at gas stations, no gas sales allowed on Sundays, and an imposed 55 mile-per-hour nationwide speed limit, even on interstates. Work horses could be both "glamorous" and a way of saving gasoline. They were a fad of the time, and I was as exuberant to do so as anyone else.
The sale lasted the entire day, and it was nearly dark when it was completed. Harlan McCoy was very successful in merchandising his lifetime accumulations, but he messed up and didn't have any lunch stands at the fairgrounds for willing buyers. There also was no young boy with five barley loaves and a couple of small fish for volunteer disciples to disperse to the hungry crowd. Lots of folks went downtown to the grocery stores to buy bread and sandwich meat. Back in those days, the gas stations maybe sold pop and candy bars, but they weren't "convenience stores" that sold other food items like gas stations do now.
I was plenty hungry, but hated to leave to go downtown for fear of missing out of excitement at the auction. Pete Becker from Hyannis had come to the sale, and had driven about 70 or 80 more miles to come than I did. We visited a bit, and he asked if I had found any lunch. With my answer being "no," he volunteered to let me have the half a can of Diet Seven-Up that he was holding. I was grateful for his benevolent donation, and eagerly accepted. To this day I think of that moment whenever I see a can of Diet Seven-Up, but even as good as it tasted that day, it has never become a favorite beverage.
Arnold Stozenburg and his wife, who ranched west of Crookston, Nebraska had also journeyed to Faith for the festivities. Arnold told me that he was pulling a new stock trailer, and if I bought any horses, I could use this trailer to haul them home. With this incentive in mind, I did buy one of the last mares through the ring. She was a wild four-year-old half Clydesdale, half Quarter Horse, and cost me $350. She was rather colorful--sorrel, with a bald face, stocking legs, and feathers on her legs. I was thankful to Arnold for the use of his trailer, and hooked it on to my pickup. He had it special ordered, twelve feet by six feet, and it was a full seven feet tall to accommodate big draft horses.
It turned into quite a project getting the new mare loaded. She was wild and not halter broke, and after getting her loaded, the vet had to give her a Coggins test. She didn't cooperate, and I regret to say she kicked a few dents into Arnold's brand new trailer.
The sun was going down as I left Faith, with cargo in tow. I was starved to death, and was happy that the restaurant in Philip was still open when I arrived. Supper tasted mighty good, but it was a terribly sleepy drive back to Merriman. Happily, I made it without wrecking the pickup, trailer, or horse. It was a day to remember.
I kept the wild half-Clydesdale, half-Quarter Horse for a couple months. Chuck Iske from south of Merriman had a nice registered Quarter Horse dun filly. I ended up trading him the McCoy special for his filly, and had to give some boot. If my memory serves correctly, I traded the dun filly to Greg Nielsen. Regretfully he doesn't remember if I did or didn't.
Here is a report from THE McCOY SALE in The Draft Horse Journal, Autumn 1978, by Richard Stene, Beresford, South Dakota:
"Where the pavement ends and the west begins,"…that was the directions Harlan McCoy gave to Faith, South Dakota, site of his sale of Clydesdale and Shire bred horses on September 22, 1978.
Blessed with a beautiful day, an enthusiastic crowd, good facilities to hold the sale, and wonderful hospitality from the people of this little South Dakota town…all things worked toward a history making sale. The crowd was unusually large and came from as far away as California, Georgia, and several Canadian provinces. Sixteen states were represented.
Some over 100 grade horses sold for an approximate average of $1200, with the top teams selling much higher than that. It was very likely the top sale of unregistered draft horses ever held in this country.
It was definitely a sale to remember, and as wild and bronky as most of those young horses were, I'd venture to say that many of them never did get broke. It was quite an event, and I'm happy to have had the experience.
By Steve Moreland, September 19, 2018
For many years I was a regular subscriber to THE DRAFT HORSE JOURNAL, billed as: "The World's Foremost Heavy Horse and Mule Publication." The magazine was started in 1964, was published quarterly, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading each issue from cover to cover. The Summer 1978 issue contained an ad that was intriguing and irresistibly appealing. This full-page advertisement read as follows:
THE DATE OF THE HARLAN McCOY CLYDESDALE AND SHIRE DISPERSAL HAS BEEN CHANGED TO: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1978. At 9:00 a.m. Mountain Time on the Rodeo Grounds at the north edge of Faith, South Dakota, harness and equipment at 9:00 a.m. Start on the horses at noon sharp.
HORSES: 50 BROOD MARES…ages 4 to 13. Half of these mares are black with white marking—several bays with white markings, some roans and grays. These mares are in range condition and will go out and do for you. They have never been babied, some of them have never had grain. So if you give them grass and water, they will do for you. They have been good to me. They have the cow-calf deal beat 2 to 1.
FOUR BLACK HERD SIRES, with all white feet and faces, from 4 to 9 years of age. They have never been babied and run out all the time.
25 SUCKING COLTS…about half of them will be black with white markings.
30 YEARLINGS…about half of them are black. The stud colts have not been castrated. There will be some good enough for studs.
20 TWO-YEAR-OLD COLTS…some of these will be good enough for studs. There will also be a few good broke saddle horses and some broke teams in harness. This is the result of 60 years of constructive breeding and raising Clyde and Shire horses.
Our motto has always been:
QUALITY IS LONG REMEMBERED AFTER THE PRICE IS FORGOTTEN.
These horses will have a clean health sheet and can go anywhere.
HARNESSES AND RELATED EQUIPMENT: 30 sets of Good Work Harness. 2 sets of World War I U.S. Army Harness. 1 set of Show Harness, 3 strap breeching, real nice. Some Driving Harness, single and double. 75 Good Collars. 1 running W. One ton of harness, ring spreaders, buckles, snap rings, copper rivets, etc. A lot of rope for halters, throw ropes, some for Scotch hobbles and numerous halters. Several hames in pairs. 2 sets of Chrome Hames, real nice. Speculum for floating teeth. Harness tools. Stitching horse. 20 pairs of good old spurs, Crocketts, Kellys, Mexican, one pair of all silver. 2 pair of Cavalry spurs. 2 pair Eagle Cavalry rosettes. Several old bits, Crockets, Kellys, handmade, and some U.S. Army bits. Sleigh bells.
HORSE DRAWN MACHINERY AND EQUIPMENT: 3 High wheeled triple box wagons, good, solid, some with original paint. Several buggies, buckboards, bobsleds, sleighs, cutters. Doubletrees for wagons and buggies. Neck Yokes. 1 set of Old Stage Coach Doubletrees. Wagon tongues. Shafts. Plows. Cultivators. Manure Spreaders. Mowers and mower parts. Sickles and sickle sections for horse mowers. Pitman sticks. 1 Chickashaw Stock Trailer 16' x 6', year old, like new.
AND SADDLES…Side Saddles, English, U.S. Cavalry. There is going to be a fine display of good old saddles, Hamleys, N. Porters, E.C. Lee, Cogshalls, Duhamels, Frasers, etc.
AND HORSESHOES…500 pair, all sizes, will be sold in pairs.
ANTIQUES, GUNS, AND MISCELLANEOUS
As they say, "too numerous to mention." The guns include Winchesters, Remingtons, Smith and Wessons, Colts, gun racks, and holsters.
Buffalo fur coat, buffalo heads, horns, canes, robes, horse blankets, etc.
Old wood burning stoves, ranges, and heaters: Warm Morning, Round Oak, Majestic Ranges, Copper Clad, Copper Boilers, etc….branding irons and cream separators.
MUST SEE TO APPRECIATE…FAR TOO MUCH TO LIST HERE.
AUCTIONEERS: Jack Cambell, Douglas, Wyoming. Stanley Christenson, Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Dick Stene, Beresford, South Dakota. Kenny McCoy, Ramona, California
Lunch available on grounds…Impossible to adequately describe. There has never been a sale quite like it.
At this time, I must interject that the part about "lunch available on grounds" turned out to be false advertising, but more about that later.
In the summer of 1978, when this advertisement came out, I was 26 years old and completely inspired by this fantastic upcoming auction. Wild horses couldn't have kept me home that day, even though I lived nearly 200 miles away. I was dating Carol McCrory, my wife-to-be, and I tried to talk her into going to the sale with me. She would have loved to go to enjoy the day, but she was working on finishing her last year of nursing school in Scottsbluff. I tried to find someone to go with me to that September sale, but didn't get any takers.
I arose way before daylight on that fabulous Friday, and left my home on Dad's Green Valley Hereford Ranch northeast of Merriman, Nebraska at 4:00 a.m. I whipped and spurred my 1974 Chevrolet half-ton pickup, and arrived in Philip ahead of 6:00 a.m. for breakfast at a restaurant. I'd have eaten even heartier had I known it would be after 8:00 p.m.—14 hours later—when I would next have anything to eat, and it would be at this same restaurant.
Another hour and a half and 82 miles later I arrived at the rodeo arena in Faith. The fairgrounds were filling up fast with people, and lots of parked cars displayed licenses from many states and Canadian provinces. The weather was beautiful, sunny and mild, with a light breeze. All seemed to be in order, but the sale didn't start quite as early as advertised. It seems that the head honcho, Harlan McCoy, was not present to give the go-ahead. About thirty minutes later, he pulled in with a truckload of horses. He had been hauling horses from the Pierre area, and had been driving most of the night.
The horses that would be offered for sale were in a pasture not too far from the arena. It was a stirring sight to see several cowboys rounding up the big herd of range horses that had "never been babied." Downright wild and bronky, with a few cockleburs decorating manes and tails, could also be a descriptive appropriate phrase in describing the Clydesdales and Shires that would soon be selling.
The antiques and collectible western memorabilia definitely lived up to expectations. This time period in the late 1970's was booming. Land prices were skyrocketing, and livestock was selling at all-time highs. Conditions would change drastically in a few short years, but euphoria ruled the day. Harlan McCoy's timing for the sale of his lifetime accumulation of collectibles and draft horses couldn't have been better. Helping to sell work horses was the fact that gas was both scarce and expensive. This was in the time period of long lines at gas stations, no gas sales allowed on Sundays, and an imposed 55 mile-per-hour nationwide speed limit, even on interstates. Work horses could be both "glamorous" and a way of saving gasoline. They were a fad of the time, and I was as exuberant to do so as anyone else.
The sale lasted the entire day, and it was nearly dark when it was completed. Harlan McCoy was very successful in merchandising his lifetime accumulations, but he messed up and didn't have any lunch stands at the fairgrounds for willing buyers. There also was no young boy with five barley loaves and a couple of small fish for volunteer disciples to disperse to the hungry crowd. Lots of folks went downtown to the grocery stores to buy bread and sandwich meat. Back in those days, the gas stations maybe sold pop and candy bars, but they weren't "convenience stores" that sold other food items like gas stations do now.
I was plenty hungry, but hated to leave to go downtown for fear of missing out of excitement at the auction. Pete Becker from Hyannis had come to the sale, and had driven about 70 or 80 more miles to come than I did. We visited a bit, and he asked if I had found any lunch. With my answer being "no," he volunteered to let me have the half a can of Diet Seven-Up that he was holding. I was grateful for his benevolent donation, and eagerly accepted. To this day I think of that moment whenever I see a can of Diet Seven-Up, but even as good as it tasted that day, it has never become a favorite beverage.
Arnold Stozenburg and his wife, who ranched west of Crookston, Nebraska had also journeyed to Faith for the festivities. Arnold told me that he was pulling a new stock trailer, and if I bought any horses, I could use this trailer to haul them home. With this incentive in mind, I did buy one of the last mares through the ring. She was a wild four-year-old half Clydesdale, half Quarter Horse, and cost me $350. She was rather colorful--sorrel, with a bald face, stocking legs, and feathers on her legs. I was thankful to Arnold for the use of his trailer, and hooked it on to my pickup. He had it special ordered, twelve feet by six feet, and it was a full seven feet tall to accommodate big draft horses.
It turned into quite a project getting the new mare loaded. She was wild and not halter broke, and after getting her loaded, the vet had to give her a Coggins test. She didn't cooperate, and I regret to say she kicked a few dents into Arnold's brand new trailer.
The sun was going down as I left Faith, with cargo in tow. I was starved to death, and was happy that the restaurant in Philip was still open when I arrived. Supper tasted mighty good, but it was a terribly sleepy drive back to Merriman. Happily, I made it without wrecking the pickup, trailer, or horse. It was a day to remember.
I kept the wild half-Clydesdale, half-Quarter Horse for a couple months. Chuck Iske from south of Merriman had a nice registered Quarter Horse dun filly. I ended up trading him the McCoy special for his filly, and had to give some boot. If my memory serves correctly, I traded the dun filly to Greg Nielsen. Regretfully he doesn't remember if I did or didn't.
Here is a report from THE McCOY SALE in The Draft Horse Journal, Autumn 1978, by Richard Stene, Beresford, South Dakota:
"Where the pavement ends and the west begins,"…that was the directions Harlan McCoy gave to Faith, South Dakota, site of his sale of Clydesdale and Shire bred horses on September 22, 1978.
Blessed with a beautiful day, an enthusiastic crowd, good facilities to hold the sale, and wonderful hospitality from the people of this little South Dakota town…all things worked toward a history making sale. The crowd was unusually large and came from as far away as California, Georgia, and several Canadian provinces. Sixteen states were represented.
Some over 100 grade horses sold for an approximate average of $1200, with the top teams selling much higher than that. It was very likely the top sale of unregistered draft horses ever held in this country.
It was definitely a sale to remember, and as wild and bronky as most of those young horses were, I'd venture to say that many of them never did get broke. It was quite an event, and I'm happy to have had the experience.
