Here come the Clydesdales!
•The breed originated in Scotland around 1750 in an area known as the Clyde valley. Flemish stallions were crossed with native Scottish mares to produce large, heavy draft horses who could do farmwork and haul the region’s coal.
•A stallion named Blaze, foaled in 1779, is the breed’s foundation sire. He stood 16.1 hands and had the two markings that Clydesdales have become known for: a white blaze on his face and four white feet.
•On average, Clydesdales stand between 16 and 18 hands tall and weigh 1,600 to 1,800 pounds.
•Anheuser-Busch, the maker of Budweiser beer, maintains the largest herd of Clydesdales in the world: approximately 250 horses.
•A team of six Clydesdales first pulled an Anheuser-Busch wagon (filled with beer from the company’s St. Louis brewery) in 1933 to celebrate the repeal of Prohibition. Since then, the horses and hitch teams have become the beer company’s primary mascots. The horses appear in print ads, marketing materials, and, of course, those Super Bowl commercials.
•In the early 1950s, Anheuser-Busch added a new animal to its Clydesdale teams—Dalmatians were fast enough to keep up with the horses and were trained to guard the wagons when drivers had to leave them unattended. Recently, the dalmatians have appeared with the Clydesdales in a series of television commercials.
To read more about draft horses, turn to page 99.
Q: Why do velvet riding helmets have a bow at the back?
A: Like so many things, the bow once had historical significance but now is just tradition. The English started putting ribbons on their hunting hats in the 1700s. The color of the ribbon denoted the type of hunting: fox hunters wore black ribbons; stag hunters wore red. The ribbons’ length showed the hunters’ societal status: Only hunt masters and their staff were allowed to have the ends of their ribbons hang below the edges of their helmets. Commoners had to cut off or glue down the tails of their ribbons, and it was a great faux pas for the “wrong” person to have the wrong ribbon length.