An event this weekend has got me thinking about horses. 

Golden Tempo, a 23-to-1 longshot colt, won the Kentucky Derby. He came from dead last at the far turn, outrunning seventeen other horses—including half a dozen who may have thought they were contending for the lead—to win by a neck. It was a breathtaking performance.

For some reason, the name Silky Sullivan came to mind. 

Silky Who?

Silky Sullivan (1955-1977) was a racehorse who became famous, in the days of my youth, for starting slow and then gobbling up incredible distances to win races. “Called the ‘California Comet’ and often ridden by Hall of Fame jockey Willie Shoemaker, Silky Sullivan once fell 41 lengths behind the field yet still won by three lengths, running the last quarter in 22 seconds,” according to Wikipedia. That was only one of many come-from-far-behind victories. “Of his 27 career starts, he was in the money 18 times with 12 wins, 1 place, and 5 shows.”

Silky Sullivan became a household word. So much so that if somebody was the last arrival at a party or meeting, somebody else might call, “Here comes Silky Sullivan!”

As a three-year-old, in March 1958, Silky won the Santa Anita Derby by three-and-a-half lengths after being 26 lengths behind. He was favored to win the Kentucky Derby two months later, but on that occasion, he made “only a brief and ineffectual bid,” losing to co-favorite Tim Tam. When his racing days were over, he was purchased and cared for by horse lover Kjell Qvale.

“There was no horse like him,” said Qvale. “Silky was a person, a unique person, and I miss him.”

I am no expert on horses. Like most people these days, I did not grow up around them, never learned to ride, and have no idea how to care for a horse. Up close, I am timid of them, because they are so big. But there is something real and compelling about a horse, at once majestic and homely. 

A Horsey World

Only a few generations back, most folks knew quite a bit about horses—how to handle them, what they needed, what they could do. 

That was essential knowledge from the time horses were domesticated, about four thousand years ago, until the invention of the motor car when my grandparents were young. Nowadays, however, unless you’re an Amish farmer, you have to go considerably out of your way to own, ride, drive, or care for horses. 

Up through about the end of the nineteenth century, most people were farmers, and farmers used horses for all sorts of things. Not only were they ridden—they pulled wagons, sleighs, plows, and early-generation farming machines such as McCormick’s reapers. 

Regular plowing could be done by regular horses, but if you had heavy sod to break and did not have oxen to pull the breaking plow, you needed draft horses—outsize, heavily-built steeds whose muscles had muscles. The best-known breeds of draft horses were Belgians, Clydesdales, and Percherons. But it’s only in the past two to three hundred years that most modern horse types emerged through selective breeding. Before that, a horse was a horse (of course, of course!). 

Horses were also used for purposes other than farming. They pulled delivery wagons and streetcars. City dwellers might keep a horse or two to pull a buggy for running about town.

The Army used horses—lots of them. A million and a half horses and mules are estimated to have died in the U.S. Civil War—two or three times the human death toll. They continued in use, for combat and for transporting men and supplies, through World War II. French boxcars in World War I were stenciled with the legend, “40/8,” to show they could hold forty men or eight horses. 

Many military leaders were horsemen—notably, General Ulysses S. Grant. Grant was not only a rider par excellence, he had a special affinity with equine ways from childhood on. Assigned as a quartermaster during the Mexican-American war, Grant decades later confided in his Memoirs, “I am not aware of ever having used a profane expletive in my life; but I would have the charity to excuse those who may have done so, if they were in charge of a train of Mexican pack mules at the time.” 

Speaking of Horses

I often think how the ubiquity of horses, before the twentieth century, has influenced our language. Old-timers like me grew up with expressions like, “Hold your horses,” because older people used those expressions. 

If you don’t know what “hold your horses” means, it’s an appeal to patience, a warning to wait. In other words, cool your jets.

To “saddle up” means you’re getting ready to go. 

Any political or other contest may be described as “a horse race.” 

To be “long in the tooth” means you’re old. It comes from the ancient practice of gauging a horse’s age by the apparent length of its teeth. Horses’ gums recede with age, making the teeth appear longer.

We talk about “harnessing” people’s talents and energies, in the hope of “spurring on” innovation. Unless, of course, we want to “rein it in.”

We rate automobiles and other engines and machines in terms of horsepower. It’s stunning to think how many horses a single car puts out of work. 

We talk of a person being “stubborn as a mule,” though most of us, unlike General Grant, have never needed to motivate a mule to productive effort.

An old term you don’t hear much but that still means something to some people is “come a cropper.” To say “he came a cropper” means he fell off a horse in the most spectacular way, catapulted over its head. But it’s used metaphorically to describe any spectacular failure in life’s endeavors. Why “came a cropper” means that, nobody seems to know exactly. But undeniably it’s a horsey term.

Will all these expressions, and others, be lost in another generation or two? That depends partly on how much longer we’ll have enough cash to fuel our cars.

So you see, Dear Reader—there’s a bright side to everything. That’s just horse sense. 

Blessings,

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer