Yesteryears

Great Depression

The American polo pony market survived financial crisis

While the stock market during the Great Depression (1929-1939) may have taken a nasty tumble, wiping out millions of dollars of financial wealth, the polo pony market in 1933 took a hit, but kept on galloping. In 1934, evidence shows that homegrown and trained American horses may have benefited from the worldwide economic downturn; and, that the 1933 East-West championship matches may have spurred more widespread use of the American polo pony, as noted in articles from that time period.

College polo continued through the Great Depression as well, helping to keep up demand for quality horses. The tournament, played on the grass at that time, generally attracted five to six teams, limited only by the problem of distance. One report from 1934 said the class of play and mounts indicated continuance of the progress in the game, which has been rapid for the past several years.

Polo, July 1933

The public auction of mounts, held at the Fred Post place on Long Island on May 27, showed that the market for good polo horses is not bad at all. The polo strings offered for sale by the estate of the late Thomas Ewing Jr. and by the United States Polo Association brought prices that must be described, considering the times, as fair.

A clear comparison with the prices brought in happier days was offered by several of the mounts, which had been sold before, two and three years ago, in that same tent and by the same persuasive tongue. Comparing the prices brought by those same horses in 1931, one finds a difference of 35 percent. Where are the stocks and the bonds that have lost only 35 percent in the past two years? Where are the motorcars, the yachts, the airplanes that have lost only 35 percent of their value in that long and dismal period?

In all, 20 polo ponies were offered for sale. Seven made up the excellent heavyweight string that belonged to Mr. Ewing at the time of his sudden and sad death from pneumonia during the winter; the other 13 belonged to the United States Polo Association. The ponies were all well known and had been played by some of the outstanding stars of the polo world. Tommy Hitchcock, the Hoppings, Winston Guest, Elmer Boeseke, Billy Post, Manuel Andrada, Jose and Juan Reynal, Alfredo Harrington and Johnny Miles. They made probably as traveled a string as you could put together, most of them having been seen in Argentina and in California as well as on Long Island, and even a few in England.

The 20 ponies ranged in price from $160 to $3,700 and brought a total of $30,035, an average of a little more than $1,500 each. This is an interesting total when one considers that the heaviest buyers of recent years did not participate in the bidding. John Sanford did not buy a horse, and it was he who hung up the record of $22,000 for Lewis Lacey’s Jupiter in 1928. Neither J.H. nor C.V. Whitney took part in the bidding. Neither J.S. Phipps nor Seymour H. Knox nor G.H. Bostwick made any purchases, and they bought the expensive horses in 1931.

Mr. Wrightsman might be called the hero of the 1933 sale. He bought five of the ponies offered and paid four of the five best prices. That he will enjoy his new ponies is hardly to be doubted, for he left soon after the sale for California, where he will play on a team with Eric Pedley, S.P. Farish and Bob Bullock.

USPA Blue Book, 1934

Much discussion has taken place in recent days as to the relative merits of the American-bred and -trained polo pony

compared with those of foreign origin and training in the game. In the early days of polo in this country, say around the late 1870s and early 1880s, the game, for the most part, was played on a domestic product.

The success of the English side in the first American entry into the International Cup in 1886 had an influence on the mounts of the players of that day, and later, for in the period directly preceding the World War, many good polo ponies were imported from both England and Ireland. At that time they were undoubtedly somewhat ahead of us in bloodlines and in training methods.

As the game developed in this country the

Toy Moon was bred in the early 1930s by Walter Dillingham in Hawaii. She proved to be an excellent playing mare.

American Thoroughbred Brown Fern was a sensation in 1936 and ‘39 International matches and the 1937 Open.

advantage of well-organized team play executed with speed became apparent, particularly to the late Harry Payne Whitney, who, in his organization of the first “Big Four” of 1909, realized that he must be at least equally mounted with his competitors if he were to have a fighting chance for victory on their grounds. A large number of ponies, which made up the stable for that famous team, were ponies, which had been imported to this country. The victory of the American team focused a large amount of attention on the team mounting and was an added incentive to American players to look for foreign mounts. This is not to say the business of importation of foreign polo ponies was large at that time. The great bulk of American players, even then, were supplied in this country. Many of the higher-rated players looked for their best ponies elsewhere. The war effectively was composed principally of men who not only played polo but also were owners of large pony ranches and understood their breeding and training. The team itself made an excellent impression not only on players but also on the general public as well, as did also their mounts. From that date, down to the present time, Argentine polo mounts have been imported and sold in this country in rather large quantities and often at rather extreme prices. Examples of this are best shown by the records.

Red Ace, played by Elmer Boeseke, was named Best Playing Pony in the East-West series. The largely American-bred horses of the West team proved to be equals of the best imported horses.

interrupted this business.

In 1922, occurred an event, which again had a very important bearing on the use of the foreign polo pony in the American game. The first Argentine team ever to visit this country came in that year. It

The Argentine team of 1928 disposed of their string of 42 mounts by auction, at the conclusion of their series of that year, at a price of $276,100 and Lewis Lacey disposed of a pony known as Jupiter, at an individual price of $22,000.

The total of the sales by auction during important polo years is $1,218,810 over a period of the last 10 years. It became so, through this influx, that whenever a high-grade The talented, predominately American-bred ponies used by the winning West side in the East-West matches of 1933 likely helped the American pony market. John Sanford bought Lewis Lacey’s Jupiter for a record $22,000 in 1928. Sanford didn’t buy a horse at the 1933 polo pony auction in Long Island.

American polo team appeared on the field, the list of ponies disclosed a very large percentage of them to be of foreign origin. Some players even came to believe that they must have them for success.

In the meantime, however, and with its inception almost at the same time as the Argentine invasion, there was instituted in this country a plan for developing remounts— the placing of stallions of quality at various points in the country where horse breeding was a natural and proven success. At the same time, many players, and those interested in breeding, had been securing from the playing field mares of experience and the result of this combination of poloplaying blood with wellselected stallions has been a product, which is quite equal to the demands put upon it in College polo also continued through the Great Depression and helped keep up demand for good horses.Yale’s 1932 Intercollegiate team was said to be of Open Championship caliber. Shown is Dunbar Bostwick, Stewart Iglehart, Mrs. Hugh Chisholm, James P. Mills and Michael Phipps.

The dun Texas-bred Bonnie J, left, was the best pony 10-goal Cecil Smith ever owned.

Cecil Smith, left, and his team won the East-West Series playing 85% American-bred horses.

The Kentucky-bred Thoroughbred Fuss Budget turned heads in the 1937-40 U.S. Opens.

The English-bred Fairy Story was purchased by Laddie Sanford in 1924, when foreign ponies were still thought to be superior.

high-class polo. Those dealers have been gathering these prospects together and, in many cases, have made excellent ponies of them.

The year 1933 might well prove the turning point for the American pony. The incident that may bring about and accentuate this return is the East-West series in Chicago held in August of this year. One of the constructive reasons for holding this series was to give a test to the growth and soundness of polo in the Western part of the country both with respect to players and mounts.

Victory went to the Western side, thus, to an

extent at least, giving support to the theory that we can and do produce and train ponies that are up to a severe test of high-goal polo with the stamina, courage, temperament and speed necessary for such a contest.

The performance is particularly accentuated by the fact that the stable of ponies used by the Western side was gathered together in haste from various sources without the usual opportunity to train, condition and fit them for the contest as a unit.

Eight-five percent of the West team’s horses were American. The West team played 28 American horses, three Argentine horses and two English, while the East played seven American ponies, 27 Argentine and five English.

What the situation now requires, more than any other one thing, is application of pony training. It is reasonably easy to understand a lack of it during the more prosperous years of the past decade when demand was so great, labor so high and produce so scarce that it was excusable to move ponies rapidly into play. However, now that these conditions have changed and there is an excellent opportunity to organize training without too great labor difficulties and costs.

There is room for a great deal of confidence and courage on the part of the domestic breeders, trainers and marketers of polo ponies. There is great scope for the creation of what should be a very successful enterprise for those with proper vision and ability.. •