Drizzly rain greeted us in the morning and it was really miserable and as we tacked up the horses there was air of unease. Chanel was really worked up; don’t forget I did not know what to expect on my first journey, I thought she knew what it was all about, she had watched us go a few times before. I told her not to worry it would be all over in a flash, I thought to myself let’s hope Biscuit has his radar on, but I think Red will be in charge until Biscuit gets the hang of things.
Taking a steady walk to our take off point helped Chanel compose herself, so without any more messing about I whispered in Red’s ear to start our very special adventure to sunny California 1930s style.
What a sight this California Ranch turned out to be, thankfully we had all arrived safely to a view to take our breath away. The ranch was like paradise with the rolling hills and fir forests surrounding it, it made you feel like you belonged there. No wonder Sea Biscuit retired there and sired many, they were dubbed, “Little Biscuits” and had thousands of visitors a year to pay homage to a great racehorse and his family.
Immediately the boys were standing there and it was such a funny but wonderful feeling to have Chanel standing beside me. There, not fifty metres away was what we had travelled through time to see, he was not a magnificent horse such as Red and our very own Biscuit, but looking at him you had to love him, he was adorable in his own unique persona. Straight away Sea Biscuit headed for Jack, who in turn whispered in his ear and stroked him gently under his chin; I think Sea Biscuit knew Jack was different, he had this way with all animals, I think I shall start calling Jack my Doctor Dolittle. The weather was gorgeous and it seemed life could not get much better; Chanel and John seemed to be like brother and sister, what a relief that was!
As we were so preoccupied with Sea Biscuit we did not notice a man come up behind us and say in a friendly voice, “Hello can I help you? This is private property you know, but now you are here I see you have met our star Sea Biscuit. What do you think of him? By the way, I am Tom Smith I look after Sea Biscuit”. Quick thinking Jack soon had Tom on our side and came out with the perfect answer to his enquiries. “Hello Tom, we are travelling around looking for work, times are so hard we would work for just board and lodgings and it would be so wonderful to work with Sea Biscuit, we are all hard workers and would be no trouble. I know we are young but we know all about horses as we have been brought up with them”.
We were lucky, children in America started work very early in the terrible 1930’s and a group of children looking for work was really nothing out of the ordinary, times were very hard and that’s why Sea Biscuit became such a hero to the working class, they needed a bit of hope from somewhere and Sea Biscuit provided a respite from their mundane lives.
Tom thought and said, “Well you are lucky, the whole ranch needs painting, you can do that if you like and if you have any spare time then you can help with the horses, would you all like that? However, you are on a trial so you will have to be good, I need this ranch to be the best”. We all nodded our approval and said thank you to Tom, how could things turn out so well! We were to stay with Sea Biscuit hopefully up until he takes on War Admiral, imagine if I could actually ride Sea Biscuit on the ranch, which would be wonderful.
Tom was a lovely man, he took us straight into a large barn to organise beds etcetera and then we had a lovely meal with the other stable hands in an outhouse used for all the meals, this was an organised stable and everyone had a job to do. We had been there but a few hours and we were already a part of the close-knit family. I felt a warm glow throughout my body, these were my type of people they had no money but were all such good friends; let’s hope this stay is going to be magic in more ways than usual.
I awoke bright and early and took the opportunity to look round the stable block. I quickly came across Sea Biscuit with his head sticking out of his stall, beside him in the next stall was his buddy Pumpkin who was a cow pony and they were inseparable. Sea Biscuit had a goat as a companion once, but he was eating all of Sea Biscuits food, so he had enough and threw the goat out of the stable by his teeth and that was the end of that beautiful friendship. Sea Biscuit loved people and animals around him, he even had a spotted stray dog called Pocatell who sometimes slept with him and weirdest of all he had a spider monkey called JoJo who slept on his neck. Our Sea Biscuit is as weird as he is wonderful and certainly had a few odd ways about him.
I helped feed some of the horses before Tom called me for breakfast; he was so nice and thanked me for helping, that’s one brownie point in my favour, I guess it would take a lot more before I could ask to sit on Sea Biscuit. It’s certainly something to aim for, which would be an impossible dream for a horse mad young lady like me.
After breakfast Tom took us to see some of the ranch, which was owned by Charles Howard an automobile dealer and prominent racehorse owner. I say some of the ranch, as it was so vast, in fact Tom said it was 65 square kilometres in all, hard to imagine that one man could own so much.
There must have been a dozen large barns to paint including the big house, most were made of wood and were in need of a couple of coats of paint. Tom told us to paint everything white, it was then I realised it was all to be done by brush, there were no paint rollers as nobody had invented them yet, but at least it’s all one colour so it shouldn’t take us long.