Happy Friday!! Here is a Flashback Friday for you, by Mant Horton:
Robert Lippitt Knight was a large man with a deep, rather gruff voice and he loved to tell stories about his horses and how he acquired them. Lyle and I spent many happy Sunday afternoons in his office at the Green Mountain Stock Farm talking with him.
One rainy afternoon he told us of the purchase of his original stock from the Phillips estate.
He had been told of the group of two stallions and four mares (Moro, Ashbrook, Croydon Mary, Ne Komia, Green Mt Twilight, and Adeline Bundy) by his grain dealer. This group was the choicest of the Phillips stock as mrs. Hall had been advised as to which were to be kept as a nucleus for future breeding.
The grain dealer succeeded only slightly in overcoming Mr. Knight’s aversion to getting into horses. He told us that his great interest in Ayrshire cattle took care of his agricultural tendencies. But, curiosity prompted him to go “just for a look.”
That “look” convinced him that these were indeed a unique strain of Morgans and he asked the price. Mrs. Hall quoted a price and Mr. Knight countered with a much lower one. This was met with a flash of temper and a flat refusal. She was furious! It was an insult! Mr. Knight told us it was never his intent to insult a lady, apologized and left with some regret thinking it was the end and that he really would have enjoyed watching those horses at Green Mountain Stock Farm. Less than a week later he received a letter from Mrs. Hall telling him she was accepting his offer and to come get the horses.
In the interval between the sale and the horses’ move to Randolph, Croydon Mary foaled, and that foal, Lippitt Welcome, was the first to bear the Lippitt prefix.
Incidentally, we heard the same story from Mrs. Hall. It was essentially the same, other than down playing her rage. She said she was amazed that a man of his means would make such a “puny” offer. But, she felt it was in the best interest of Mr. Phillips’ breeding program to accept, thus ensuring a continuation of the line.
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Originally published in a May/June 1994 issue of the LCN, this piece was republished in a 2001 collection of Mrs. Winifred Horton’s writings titled “Lippitt Lore.” (Mrs. Horton was lovingly known as “Mant.”) She and her husband Lyle were very involved in the breeding of Lippitt Morgans, under the prefix of “Horton’s.”
