[QUOTE=Mara;4725457]
Al-Marah and Varian are still around; Bazy Tankersley and Sheila Varian have ALWAYS insisted that their horses have a purpose and a job other than getting wiggy on the end of a shank. The Arabians they breed are gorgeous, but they do as the Arab was meant to do - perform in a variety of disciplines.[/QUOTE]
That is definitley true. I’m a huge Sheila Varian fan. But, it also helps to have a vast family fortune.
What was the Varian family fortune? IIRC, she was a schoolteacher in her younger years, and that’s not the sort of thing some rich girl who wants to play with horses would do…
I always thought of them as one of the last of the era where “the exceptional stallion made the farm famous”, rather than as more recently has been the case, where “the farm makes the so-so stallion famous”.
I got to see a couple of investment/tax-shelter farms just before the crash. I was involved in University horse-judging teams and we got to tour a number of beautiful barns.
One of the Arab barns we saw stands out in my mind. Owners were rich non-horse people but enjoyed the status and hoopla. The barn I saw was a show and sale barn. It was all set up for in-hand and “liberty” showing. I dont think there was riding tack on the property. The manager informed us that these were halter Arabians and “too valuable to be ridden!” He very nicely took out a couple of the horses and had them stood up while he explained points of conformation and breed type.
Then he confided that this is not how a buyer would see the horse. He pointed to the window that overlooked the small arena. The buyer would not enter a barn but would be escorted directly to the climate-controlled Viewing Area complete with bar and food. Then he told the assistant to put on a show. The arena lights dimmed and flashed and a smoke machine started (honest!). Meanwhile, the handler was in the barn aisle getting the horse worked up - spinning it, jerking on it and cracking a whip (not pretty). Then he slipped of the halter and let it snort and blow into the arena. A couple of assistants would keep it moving and firey. Buyers who bothered to see the horse commonly never saw it standing still and only viewed through the glass!
No wonder there were so many Arabians not trained to ride or drive when the market collapsed!
Regardless of the money, Sheila Varian is a class act who breeds beautiful, quality useful horses. She is an amazing horsewoman and there are not many like her in the horse world.
To be honest, I see in her biography on her website that she had to borrow money from her aunt to keep her farm running in the beginning. I was told while living on an arabian breeding farm in the 80’s that Sheila was a member of the family that owned the businesses below. Was that misinformation?:
Somewhat irrelevant because I think the family sold out years ago but this is ONE division of Varian which just sold for 1.5 BILLION:
http://www.agilent.com/about/newsroom/presrel/2009/27jul-gp09016.html
Also:
http://www.varian.com/ (semiconductors)
If you’ve had an x-ray or MRI there is a good chance you have met a Varian instrument but they are in general a technology company with all kinds of technology. Varian is into all areas of Technology. I would guess it has all been taken public over the years…
I still have my Khemosabi daughter, she’s 33.
She was a true English pleasure horse with tons of natural trot. Yet, after we left the ring, I could toss my young kids on her back and walk through the dark to our aisle in the show barn.
Yes, those Khemo daughters are something! I knew three of them. One of them produced my all time favorite foal. He unfortunately died young, he fell in his paddock, slid under the fence and broke his leg. His owners tried everything to save him including amputation an prosthetic leg but he just couldn’t handle it. He was out of a Khemo daughter by a Bask son and he was amazing. He would have been a top stallion for sure even amongst the zillion Khemo/bask crosses he stood out.
Arabian Horse World, now that was a class magazine. I still have some of the pictures pasted in an adolescent scrap book. I had all those bloodlines memorized. Every birthday, I got to go to the Arabian Horse show in Santa Barbara, CA–the Earl Warren showgrounds. That was back when the Washington International Horse Show was still at the DC Armory.
Varian Electronics was founded in 1948 and Sheila Varian has been in the Arabian business since the 1950s (Her “golden jubilee” was held a few years ago.) She imported her first Polish Arabs in the early 1960s. I do not know for sure (and my understanding is that “Varians” in general are pretty private), but I think her father or one of her uncles were involved in the founding. I doubt they had that much money when she was first getting started…
I also got Arabian Horse World for about 12 years; my grandmother gave it to me as an Xmas gift every year starting when I was 12 (1976). The stallion issue was well over 1000 pages (split into two volumes) at the height of the boom. I used to draw pictures based on the photos in AHW. Unfortunately my parents threw them away at some point.
My former horse was an Arabian mare foaled in 1984. Her story before I owed her was similar to all of yours. I did some research on the breeding barn in Utah that she was born. Sometime in the early 80’s it "evaporated."She was likely sold as breeding stock to the barn I bought her from. She was not a give away horse. She was in foal to an Andulsian stallion every year until I bought her. She wasn’t really ridden until I bought her. Thanks for the post. I don’t hear enough good things about Arabs these days.
Well, it looks like my little thread is winding down. Many thanks to everybody who shared stories, and I loved hearing from folks who still own horses from that era.
I would still recommend listening to the radio show (link posted in first post) if this is a topic of interest to you.
Druid, you sure brought back a lot of memories. I met a few celebrities at the Nationals when Arabians were ‘investments’. Gawd, talk about glitz, glamour and glitter back in the day! Not all of them thought that way, and the ones who didn’t still have them to this day. Wayne Newton and the Swayzes come to mind as people who love them as horses, and riding horses at that. 
[QUOTE=Sonesta;4724272]
It was a horrifying time. Horses were abandoned at farms and the farms sent them to slaughter or to the lowest end auctions you can imagine. I bought several at that time for pennies - including the wonderful black stallion we stood for many years - Fyre One. He was an Aladdinn son out of the Bask mare, Fyre Love. She had sold in foal with Fyre for the highest price for an Arabian mare in history at that time. And he was just abandoned at the farm where he was boarded.[/QUOTE]
Wow, Sonesta, that is so interesting, I think that would make a great article for Equus or another magazine, if you haven’t already. Or even if you have, it would be good for people to read about in this age of speculation.
We had one of the “biggie” farms in our area and subsequently in the practice I joined after vet school ( I am sure winfield farm knows them). Although the bubble had burst by the time I graduated we still dealt with a lot of fall out not the least of which were huge outstanding vet bills.
Somewhere in my posession, I have the accountant’s report- gorgeous, spiral bound and glossy- that the farm gave to prospective clients. I also had a list of investors and syndicate members on certain horses. Shocking number of business savvy individuals with one thing in common… virgins to the horse industry. My father, a very successful businessman in the area, was approached but when they found out we already owned horses, they backed off… obvious. If you looked at the prospectus it was ludicrous.
As I recall… one mare 100k. Ten syndicate shares. The farm retained one share. All expenses were then split 10 ways… while the mare stayed at the farm ( shareholders paid all vet, board, breeding fees etc). Of course bred to one of the farms stallions. Selling the foal was the big pay-off of course. LOL! I think the first foal from that particular mare $1300! Thank heavens for the tax write off! Most disturbing to me is the farm keeping the mare just as they would have had she not been syndicated and reaping money not only on the initial buy-in but for board etc etc. Of course they retained all decision making rights also.
I do believe this farm owner went to jail eventually, although I think it was unrelated.
Of course the TB industry went through a very similar cycle but their end product had a higher value and an already established auction market for their product. Not to mention the potential to actually win a little money along the way if you were lucky!
I had a family friend refer a boarder/client to me, who had Egyptian Arabians. She had a friend in the area who had them, also. That led to several years of going to the shows, and the Egyptian Event, down in Lexington, KY.
There was a fellow named David Gardiner, who was managing the Ruminaja Ali syndicate, if memory serves. I remember a sale that they did at Fasig Tipton. This guy could market with the best- the quality of everything that was done was top notch. Presentation, brochures-- the lot. I knew several other people in the area who ended up buying a couple of these horses- and then, they bought something else to actually ride. Very strange times.
The family friend had a really nice mare, and I started her in dressage. She was a lovely, smart, talented mare. We had a whole lot of fun at horse shows, and she did her share of winning.
When the wheels fell off, it was just a massive mess. Most of those folks had no idea what to do with the horses, and all of the horrors described apparently began. Poor horses!
Princess is by a Ruminaja Ali son out of a Khemo daughter.
I love that mare to pieces
Apparently, I didn’t have enough coffee this AM as the above should read Princess’ PASTUREMATE lol.
I drive past Stonebridge Farm, in Ont. twice a day.
I still remember the gala’s, the floodlights, the celebrities and helicopters…
I still remember the day the owner disappeared and that you coudn’t sell those horses at the local auction.
MANY of them went to the KB’s. I’d say most, even.
NJR
Ziggy, I’ve never had the heart to write about it. But I am reminded of it daily, as one of my dearest friends is Rhita McNair - the famous Arabian trainer who was married to equally famous Tom McNair.
Rhita is a real lady and when the market burst, she and Tom were out of jobs (Glennloch Farm) and fell onto increasingly bad times. Now Tom has died and Rhita is still riding 6-8 horses a day (she’s in her 70s) but mentally she still lives in the 80s when things were riding high. She just has not been able to accept that her wonderful horses are no longer worth many tens of thousands of dollars. She breaks my heart.
Can’t mention the McNairs without thinking of Sakr. Now that was a horse.
This thread brings back memories of a different kind for me. In the mid-80’s I worked for an equine hospital that was sitting smack-dab in the middle of Arab World Central - Bell Road, Scottsdale. The farm across the street, the name of which I can NOT remember, stood Padron if I recall. I remember going to one or two of their “shows” and watching the horses dancing around at the end of the threads that passed for lead shanks.
Lasma was down the street and I saw the stall that Bask lived in, by then turned into a memorial.
And I went to an auction at the big place on Scottsdale Road - another one I can’t remember the name of. But it was theater at its best.
What I found so strange is that all of these farms would dump most of their colts for something like $100 each every year. They wanted mares. (I’m now in the TB world and it is just the opposite.)
My very dear friend’s husband was the stall manager at the Scottsdale show for years and years. We would go out there together and gawk at both the horses and the people.
Lots of memories - all those farms are gone now, replaced by McMansions packed in like sardines. But that’s life I guess, always moving on.
The one other thought from the glory days that comes to my mind was the shockingly (to me anyway) amount of money it cost for folks to show the Arab show circuit. My manager at work and I would chat horses all the time, and when she told me how much it cost for a one weekend show for her, I almost fell out of my chair, as it was more than I would spend on the AQHA show circuit for a whole year!
But then again, I recall she came to see me at an AQHA show once, and she came at lunch break, as we were all in the arena schooling our horses (everything from WP, jumping, and reiners), and when I came out of the ring, she was pale and shaken that anyone would ride in such chaos!
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