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Amazing grace samples are copyright © Charles Littleleaf and cannot be duplicated and/or used in any manner, without written permission by
Redwood Productions and/or their affiliates.
THE JOURNEY OF “SAMPLE”
by: Carolyn R. Miller
As the story was told to me by Mrs. Lois Myler, wife of the late Vance Myler both of
VanLo’s Rainbow Ranch. Vance Myler passed away in 1994 and on my visit to Van Lo’s it was noticed that “Sample” appeared to be in a state of mourning. He had dropped in weight and his attitude was one of depression. After what appered to be a period of a couple years the Old Man Sample, well into his 30’s miraculously came out of his depression and by 1997 his weight had returned and he was seen running through the Van Lo pasture once again.
As the story goes Vance was at Art Kaltveldt’s home one day in Eastherville, Ia. when he spotted what he knew to be a most unusual marked little foal. Art was known for dealing with buying and auctioning ponies so the real background is lost but it is known that the sire and dam that Vance saw was then known as Judy a solid sorrel and Cocoa, a chocolate bald face stallion with two socks. Vance took the little guy home and raised him to be a beautiful, lively high two stepping pony who was identified by his apron face, bonnet, shield and dark hair down his back. Sample was what we know of today as a complete patterned “Frame Overo”. At the time both Vance and Lois lived about 90 miles from the Dakotas in a town called Spirit Lake, Ia. about 12 miles from Art.
Sample was soon spotted by another one of Vance’s buddies and he offered to allow Vance pasture space over the winter if Vance would only allow him to keep Sample in with his two mares a buckskin and a black named Black Apache. The following spring two frame overo fillies were born. Black Apache’s filly was named Tadita and the other mares filly died fairly young.
Vance brought home Sample and his first daughters were by Silverdale’s Dainty Denise known as Gypsy a black, Nipsy a black and Scarlet a bay. Another daughter was Nacona.
Vance also ended up back at Art’s to bring home Tadita as she had foundered badly and Vance doctored her back to health by putting in hours of work and soaking Tadita’s hooves in old oil. As we can see today Tadita has had many beautiful overo foals into her upper years. One such son was the famous LTD’s Two Tone Trigger formerly owned and raised by Randy Weiner.
Sample was bred to an own daughter to get Sandy, and Sandy was bred back to Sample again to get Wendy. Wendy crossed to Shredder produced Magic Man. Sandy was quite white with black flank spots, medicine hat and died at Margie Miller’s. Margie Miller at one point bought out some of the Myler mares in exchange for “Fame”. So Fame came home to the Myler’s once again. Fame was one of the loudest AMHA frames out of a Sample bred daughter. Fame was registered with AMHA at the last hour of its open Registry by Margie Miller and her frame son was bred to many of the Millers AMHA cross registered mares.
A couple of other men who owned horses from the Van Lo herd were Gary Graham and Randy Weiner. When 18 of the Shelley Friesen herd, originally purchased from Van Lo’s were sold it was the two men who alternately bought the horses splitting the herd in two. In this group was Sample bred Gypsy, Funny Face, Nipsy, Scarlet, Angel, Judy and a Sample and Scarlet filly named Senorita, as well as several fillies and colts by Sample and Shorty. Also in the purchase was Dainty Denise used extensively in the Van Lo program. All of the Sample AMHR horses were placed in the Registry when it was open.
A breeder purchased the following Van Lo horses from Margie Miller of Sedalia, Mo. The white Wendy, Sandy, Concha, Sue Ellen and Elvira with coloring as follows:
Wendy, totally white except for a black pigmentation on her head
Sandy, a reddish with flank florets,
med. Hat, a lot of base white and cap was
black.
Sue Ellen, was a black and white pinto
Elvira, was a bay roan
Concha, was similar to Sandy but black florets, cap etc.
Rolling Green Red Crescent King was used as a back-up and was not used for the AMHR stock.
The original classic breeding stock was Star Attraction and two hackney mares, Misty and Bobbie purchased from Bob Jones.
Brislawn Reservation:
The “Wild Cayuse Ranch” in Moorecroft, Wyoming is home to the “Spanish Mustangs” owned by Mr. Emmette Brislawn started by his father. He also started the Spanish Mustang Registry in 1957, boasting over 2000 members and growing rapidly. At my site you will find LINKS to the Brislawn Reserve and the Registry. This part of the story carries forward with a trip made by Jim and Kay Hembree of Rockwood, Tenn. in 1996. The pictures taken at this time were by Kay Hembree and they are embedded on this site. Further pictures may be seen of the old foundation Mustangs at the Links section of my web site.
“Once upon a time”, Emmette’s Dad, Robert Brislawn made a decision to save the remaining wild plaines “Spanish Mustang”, and in doing so maintained them at his ranch for breeding purposes to perpetuate the purity of the bloodlines.
As the story goes, Emmette relayed to Jim Hembree that his Dad Robert had sold three or four small paint mares to someone in Iowa back in the early 1900’s. We believe this may connect the old “SAMPLE” color right back to the Brislawn Reserve due to the rarity of the pattern at that time. (note: the Brislawn’s did not call horses overos, they called them just plain paints and pintos were called tobianos. So we know the difference in colors was known.) Mr. Brislawn stated that occasionally he got blanketed appaloosas out of the “Spanish Mustang” horses.
Much of the foundation stock was linked to the San Domingo breeding and at the time of Jim and Kays visit Sequoyah and Sundowner were seen chasing the wind on the plaines and in command of their herd. Sequoyah was sired by a dun, and out of a grulla mare and paternal paint grand dam. Again, back in my LINKS you will find the pictures of both of these horses with their registered numbers.
Now to add just another dimension to this story let us look at the latest book by Jeanette Gower, “Horse Color Explained”.
Origin of the Overo
As quoted from Ms. Gower’s book, p.76
Overo has not been a colour of European horse breeds and is thought to be a mutation that first occurred in the New World. For quarantine reasons, New World blood has not had an influence on the Australian horse, with the result that overo only appeared in Australia with the importation of American Paint stock in the early 1970’s. Australia then became one giant testing ground for the study of the overo coat pattern. Crossed with the Thoroughbred and other foundation stock with, quite obviously, no overo breeding background, the overo reproduced in typical Mendelian fashion as a simple dominant. (see DNA Glossary in Links) Lethal White foals were unheard of until the introduction of overos to this country, and these only occurred in matings of overo parents.
Ms. Gower goes on to state: It has been suggested in the United States that there are several subtypes of overo. The Australian experience does not support this, as the subtypes suggested, sabino and splashed white have always been present in Australia. For this reason the sabino and splashed white should never be referred to as overos.
Once a breeder understands the sabino colour pattern, than an understanding of all the other broken-coloured patterns falls into place.
Now that it is possible to do blood marker analysis on overo and tobiano, it should be possible by exclusion to identify as sabino those horses not carrying the overo or tobiano blood markers.
The aforementioned was taken directly from Ms. Gower’s book available for purchase at Amazon.com Additionally, this writer is in agreement with her. I believe that in order to avoid the lethal white overo foal the use of sabino and splashed finds a suitable breeding partnership with the frame.
It is also my belief as rare as the pattern was that “Sample” was the product of one of those direct lines coming into Iowa that go directly back to the Brislawn Reserve.
This article is ofcourse subject to error and omissions and may not be reproduced without prior permission. All pictures here are by Miller’s or by Kay Hembree.
If anyone has further information that may be added to this story on Sample please get in touch with me to further the content. Carolyn Miller
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