My Earliest Hobby Days

In October, 1970, this was my introduction to the (fledgling) formal hobby.

I was an avid reader of Horse and Rider magazine and it ran an article about Ellen Hitchins and Simone Smiljanic's photo showing club, IMPHSA. (The International Model Photo Horse Show Association.) After reading the article, I wrote to Ellen at the address listed in the article and joined her club.

Those were heady days when the hobby was in its infancy and collectors were "meeting" each other through photo shows and pen pal corresponding. Live shows back then were very localized, backyard affairs. (Go here to read about the local live shows my friends and I held in the 1960s.) Photo showing allowed us to find other collectors and form lasting friendships with other hobbyists around the country and even the world.

I even bought a few customs to show. The first was Pace's Hi Hopes, a r/r/h done by Sherry Cook. He won multiple championships in the 1970s and is one of my never-sell pieces in my collection.

The 1980s were busy times for me as our six children were little and there was no time or money for photo showing. But I remained part of the hobby and then in 1988 when the kids were all a little older, began photo showing again.  Live showing had become more than simple backyard shows by then, and I started live showing in the early 1990s.

A snapshot of part of my collection taken in 1994.

Model horse collecting and showing brings me happiness and I will mark my forty-ninth year in the hobby next month.

Maybe I'll do something special in October, 2020 to celebrate my fiftieth year.

Early Photo Show Ephemera

Recently a friend invited me to come to her home this fall and "play ponies."  She asked that I bring my earliest show horse and share a little bit about my experience with the hobby as it was getting off the ground back in the early 1970s.

I'm going to be under a lifting restriction for a couple of months, so I figured that now was the time to go through my tubs of hobby ephemera and pull out what I wanted to bring with me.

This is the model that I plan to take, my first custom, a r/r/h (repaint/remade/haired; what customs were called back then.) This is Paces Hi Hopes, a Hartland that was done by Sherri Cook in 1970. I got him in 1971 and he did very well in photo shows, winning championship after championship.

I still need to get him out of my china cabinet in the living room, but I will wait until closer to the get together to do that.

As I went through my tubs, I found a shoe box stuffed with envelopes that had my 1970s show models' names on them.

Pace's Hi Hopes' envelope was very full.

 I had forgotten how creative early show hosts had been as they made awards for their shows.

Look at the lettering on this high point award - my guess is that the show hostess put the ribbon through her typewriter. What a challenge that would have been, but the ribbon looks great.

I love the Indian Pony, so this ribbon made me smile. Looks like the photo was cut from a Breyer manual.

 A few shows even gave out commercial flats. The one in the upper left hand corner, from a California show held by Sue Seese in 1972, was actually won by another of my models, but I included it to show the range of what hobbyists handed out in the early days of photo showing.

Dittos (mimeographs) were sometimes used, too. Joyce McMaster made certificates for her show and then filled each one out by hand. What a lot of work!

I also found some ephemera related to photo showing that I thought would be fun to bring along, too.

These are results from a 1971 IMPHSA show - check out those performance classes. Western, English... have things changed or what?

 Anyone remember Marney's model, In-A-Tiff? It was reserve high point horse in this show.

 I founded the All Breeds Model Horse Showers Association in 1972 and ran the club until I went off to college. This is the first issue. Pace's Hi Hopes is featured in the inaugural "Horse of the Month" column.

In addition, I found this response to a letter that I had written to Breyer asking for a current list of model horse clubs. Back then, the only way you could get information about the hobby was to write and ask for it. Phone calls were very expensive because you were charged long distance fees. (The USPS really benefitted from the hobby until it moved online!)

Going through all those tubs and seeing mementos from the earliest days of the hobby was really fun. I'm glad that I was lucky enough to be a part of it as it all began.