How about they run the event as they want and if you do not like it you don’t go… It is private property and it is up to the owner what they want to call it. Hell, what about the people that live in Intercourse, PA?
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Have they cancelled the lease for everything or just USEA events?
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My guess is that PFEE and the money and donations pulled into the underlying 501c3 went a long way to funding the maintenance of the property in a way that allowed it to remain a useful and suitable property for hosting 4-h events, amongst other activities.
As part of Mr. Walker’s letter canceling the lease with PFEE, he specifically mentions he will work with them to remove all of their equipment (I think the word equipment was used) from the property after the event runs this weekend.
I assume that means jumps. Any jump that isn’t a permanent structure on that property.
Think about that. If the jumps go away… well… so do all unrecognized events at this venue. As well as cross country schooling at this location.
If PFEE is out of it… who will maintain the arenas that were put in, so that they are useful for 4-H activities? Hopefully someone with 4-H can engage with the property owner in a personal and polite way, so that the beautiful site and SIGNIFICANT investments that have been made in the arenas at this site don’t go completely to waste.
I truly am stunned that some folks don’t quite realize how unwise and counterproductive it was to come at BOTH Mr. Glaccum & Mr. Walker this way. Both offered something really important that benefited the sport. Without Mr. Glaccum’s work over the span of years and years… this competition and others wouldn’t have even existed. The team involved in making Plantation Field and all the competitions held there… they are likely gone for good from the sport because of this. The younger generation can think whatever they wish of Mr. Glaccum personally…
but… did they actually read the article Nancy Jaffer just wrote about his lifetime of contributions to the sport? Did they read Jimmy Wofford’s words about Denis? If not… I kind of think they should.
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Me too, VHM - me too.
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PFEE lost the lease on the land. So to me, that reads that all events are now gone because PFEE handled the contracts with other groups.
Strictly my interpretation, of course.
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I saw those comments as well. I kind of hope Sports Illustrated picks this up and somehow, someway, the facts will be brought to light.
I want PFEE to get the lease back, run it as Plantation Hill, and for Mr. Cuyler to kick EN to the curb permanently.
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This is what class looks like. Well done Boyd, so sad for the loss of this, “The Best Event Ever” as EN put it last year…
https://www.boydandsilvamartin.com/weekend-wrap-up/
Finally, I’d like to say a big thank you to the Walker family, who own the land on which the event takes place. I’ve been lucky over the years that they have been wonderful supporters who have owned horses outright as well as bought shares in syndicates, and they’ve been very generous to let this event run on their property. If 2020 does happen to be the last event, I want to tell them how generous they’ve been over the years and how much we’ve appreciated using this wonderful land. It’s also been a privilege and an education being on the board of Plantation Field Equestrian Events and I’ve learned a lot about how much goes into putting on these big events.
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As I sincerely do not believe Morven Park is at any risk of falling victim to cancel culture, as it has devoted supporters across a wide breadth of the equestrian community far outside of simply eventing, and it has some incredibly powerful allies in terms of long time supporters who cover the full breadth of the political spectrum and are deeply connected to the most powerful political circles in and around the Washington D.C. area… I’m going to point out a little background info regarding history that apparently occurred at Morven Park, and I invite other people to just think about it a bit.
If I could link to my source, without my post going to the “unapproved” place… I would. But my account won’t let me post links anymore as the forum software seems to have flagged me as a Russian bot or something :lol:
- I’m not - but that’s the situation with my account…
Anyway, if you Google “Morven Park + Mary Mallory” you will find a Washington Post article from 2005, written by Eugene Scheel, with the title “A Former Slave’s Life, Revealed in Bits and Pieces” comes right up.
If you read the article, you will learn it details an extensive investigation a historian decided to undertake to learn more about the life of one Mary Mallory, a woman who was at one time a slave, living at Morven Park, and owned by one Thomas Swann… former Governor of Maryland and the owner of Morven Park for many decades. The beautiful residence everyone admires, which is prominently featured in the backdrop of some of the photos when eventers routinely gallop around the Morven Park course was once the residence of Thomas Swann. I’m pretty sure… but likely it was modified over the years, and added onto by Westmoreland Davis, and went through a restoration at some point. However… history did indeed occur in that residence.
What history? Well… according to a descendent of Mary Mallory (Alberta Lee Andersen) that the historian (Deborah Lee) at the heart of the investigation into details of Mary Mallory’s life personally interviewed as part of her historical investigation:
“It was really something in those days, because if you were a pretty black girl, now you could eat at the dining room table, after the master and his family [had] eaten,” Anderson told Lee. “After a while, she became his girlfriend, whatever you want to call it, you know. And then, before you knew it, children were born, and it was quite a thing back in those days.”
Anderson told Lee that Mallory’s mother “didn’t have a lot of choice. . . . So that’s why I guess we blacks are every color there is.”
Deborah Lee and a few other people mentioned in the article were exceptionally diligent and careful to go looking for information from a number of documents at various locations in Loudoun County, to try and find a primary source that would provide some sort of independent conformation that this sort of thing actually took place at the Morven Park residence with the “master” there, the dining room, and “pretty black girl’s”…
They found an actual photo of Mary Mallory… as she lived to the incredible age of 108. The also found information about her in a 1921 edition of the Loudoun Mirror, when they actually published a lengthy obituary pertaining to Mary Mallory, because she was a well respected woman in the local area, and had lived to the age of 108. That document confirmed her residence at Morven Park for many years prior to the Civil War. The historians who looked into this issue in depth dug further into available county records, and eventually found records from an 1870 census of Loudoun County residents that included information about Mary Mallory. The information included that she was the mother of 4 children at that time… three of whom were born prior to the Civil War, while she was still enslaved. The records listed the race of these children of Mary Mallory… and three of the four were described as “mulatto” in the records.
Sooooo…
For anyone who has bothered reading another one of my lengthy posts on this thread, and not tuned out already because they found this information truly sad and disturbing to read about (I’m sorry if it has upset anyone… but it is publicly available information that the Washington Post wrote a detailed article about back in 2005)…
You tell me? Which venue do you think is more painful and insensitive for eventers to go galloping around on a cross country course…
the one named “Plantation Field”… where apparently no slaves actually every lived, and which was given that name because of a Boy Scout project?
Or the one that features the beautiful old mansion in the background of many photographs related to equestrian activities occurring on the grounds these days… a mansion that apparently has a dining room in it, where the “master” used to invite “pretty young black girls” to eat… only after he and his family had finished eating… and then later… where “mulatto” children were born to slave women who lived at Morven Park…
Call me decidedly stupid, or lecture me on critical race theory, or tell me that I just don’t understand the best way to be a “racial ally” or whatever else you think I am just not understanding… suit yourself…
But I find Morven Park the more problematic competition venue. Because I think ACTUAL FACTS AND ACTUAL HISTORY MATTER more than vocabulary debates whose entire purpose seems to be virtue signaling on the part of white people, so that they can then declare themselves an empathetic ally of black people and “sensitive” to issues pertaining to the historic abuses of slavery in America.
Lastly… for the record… I am going to again note that I do not think this history is a reason for Morven Park to be cancelled. Nope. Not at all.
@atl_hunter shared a really interesting story and link a few posts back that I thought was positive and strong. The idea was that people could find a different way to remember, honor, and work through painful history pertaining to slavery in America. Maybe that’s a way for everyone who is planning on competing at Morven Oark in a few more weekends can think about this. As you all are enjoying riding your horse there, and your life in America in the year 2020, think about the women who did live and work and eat in the dining room at that residence over 150 years ago. Think about what they went through. Care about it. Give thanks that you, today, in America, are not going through something like that. Maybe take a little more time to realize though, that some people in different corners of the world still do live in countries where this sort of thing is actually NOT specifically outlawed. And that fact, personally, is something that takes my breath away and makes my stomach and heart hurt. But here in America… even though we have plenty of things wrong with our society, and are still far from perfect… it is no longer legal or widely acceptable for one group of human beings to treat another group of human beings the way pretty young black women were indeed treated at Morven Park many years ago.
Let’s maybe pause, and all agree that this is a good thing and something we should be proud about. And for the record… I think it would be a poetic and wonderful thing if one day our sport saw a black, female competitor gallop freely across the course at Morven Park, and win the whole darn competition. That would be a beautiful triumphant thing to see on so many levels, and worthy of deep thought, and celebration. To me… that is so much more important and meaningful to think about and hope for, than these ugly small arguments concerning words.
Enough said. I truly hope this post hasn’t offended or triggered anybody… but I think this history of Morven Park really shouldn’t be swept under the rug.
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I believe they also installed electricity and wifi per previous posts?
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Won’t happen…or I would be shocked if it did.
Take a look in Twitterland…the comments there are pretty ugly.
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I’m a belligerent optimist.
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I hope the tweets of people with names like “Helmet Bitch” won’t stop any conversations about possible reconsideration of the decision.
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How would you feel if you were the landowner subject of these tweets? Feeling all warm and fuzzy yet?
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said person has a pretty large following on social media
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What we are discussing?
Last question you asked: Yes, to at least some extent although they try not to over-interpret some behavior by white people - and, read the articles/editorials posted on EN by riders, eventers and interested horse people of color for the answer directly from the source.
If everything were great, this discussion and the issue of the name ‘plantation’ wouldn’t even be on the radar, at all.
To withdraw from eventing over it would mean that, to be consistent, I’d have to withdraw from all society in general. That’s not making anything better, in fact it leaves the field to the worst actors. That is why this issue ever came up in the first place. There is a problem, it’s pretty much universal, and the best we can do is chip away at it to make it better. Sorry if that makes you uncomfortable.
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That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What we are discussing?
Last question you asked: Yes, to at least some extent although they try not to over-interpret some behavior by white people - and, you can read for yourself the articles/editorials posted on EN by riders, eventers and interested horse people of color for the answer directly from the source.
If everything were great, this discussion and the issue of the name ‘plantation’ wouldn’t even be on the radar, at all.
To withdraw from eventing over it would mean that, to be consistent, I’d have to withdraw from all society in general. That’s not making anything better, in fact it leaves the field to the worst actors. That is why this issue ever came up in the first place. There is a problem, it’s pretty much universal, and the best we can do is chip away at it to make it better. Sorry if that makes you uncomfortable.
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What we are discussing?
Last question you asked: Yes, to at least some extent although those I have spoken with have said that they try not to over-interpret some behavior by white people - and, you can read for yourself the articles/editorials posted on EN by riders, eventers and interested horse people of color for the answer directly from the source.
If everything were great, this discussion and the issue of the name ‘plantation’ wouldn’t even be on the radar, at all.
To withdraw from eventing over it would mean that, to be consistent, I’d have to withdraw from all society in general. That’s not making anything better, in fact it leaves the field to the worst actors. That is why this issue ever came up in the first place. There is a problem, it’s pretty much universal, and the best we can do is chip away at it to make it better. Sorry if that makes you uncomfortable.
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What we are discussing?
Last question you asked: Yes, it is or may be happening from time to time, to at least some extent although those I have spoken with have said that they try not to over-interpret some behavior by white people - and, you can read for yourself the articles/editorials posted on EN by riders, eventers and interested horse people of color for the answer directly from the source.
If everything were great, this discussion and the issue of the name ‘plantation’ wouldn’t even be on the radar, at all.
To withdraw from eventing over it would mean that, to be consistent, I’d have to withdraw from all society in general. That’s not making anything better, in fact it leaves the field to the worst actors. That is why this issue ever came up in the first place. There is a problem, it’s pretty much universal, and the best we can do is chip away at it to make it better. Sorry if that makes you uncomfortable.
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What we are discussing?
Last question you asked: Yes, it is or may be happening from time to time, to at least some extent although those I have spoken with have said that they try not to over-interpret some behavior by white people.
And, you can read for yourself the articles/editorials posted on EN by riders, eventers and interested horse people of color for the answer directly from the source.
If everything were great, this discussion and the issue of the name ‘plantation’ wouldn’t even be on the radar, at all.
To withdraw from eventing over it would mean that, to be consistent, I’d have to withdraw from all society in general. I’m not a ‘cancel culture’ person. That’s not making anything better, in fact it leaves the field to the worst actors. That is why this issue ever came up in the first place. There is a problem, it’s pretty much universal, and the best we can do is chip away at it to make it better. Sorry if that makes you uncomfortable.
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Why I don’t follow twitter. Anyone who tries to live their lives so as to stay on the good side of people with names like ‘Helmet Bitch’ is in for a tough slog.
Some people are worth listening to, and we all choose. That also is what this conversation is about. Who do we care about listening to, who should get our attention. “We” being each of us as individuals, of course.
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