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So what are those horses?

By DAN KEGLEY/Staff

Shannon Simpson always thought a newspaper story about her horse breeding operation would begin by asking: “What are those horses beside the Chilhowie post office?”
And so it does.
Those are Lipizzans, the statuesque, oft-beleaguered and, as a result, rare breed of horses known for their equally rare blend of courage, gentleness, strength and beauty.
Statuesque, indeed. One of Simpson’s horses, Pluto Delphina, has the barn name Greco, for the gelding looks as though he could have been carved from white marble in the classical Greek style.
Rare, indeed. Two thousand to 3,000 Lipizzans exist in the world. Fifteen hundred are in the United States. One of Simpson’s horses is rarer still, one that, like all Lipizzaners, is born with a dark color that lightens through age six or seven, but unlike most does not lose the coloration. At any one time there may be 20 of these in the world, making colored Lipizzans the rarest horses of all.
Simpson and her husband, Scott, own Four Pillars Farm on Old Stage Road. Scott Simpson is Smyth County’s county engineer, and Shannon Simpson works the horses, the largest herd, she said, on the east coast. The Simpsons have been there three years, buying the well-known Apperson house, building a 15-stall horse barn behind it, an arena beyond that, all on 13 acres tucked quietly in a hollow on the north edge of town.
Sixteen horses and a donkey named Lucky make up the equestrian population that includes the first Lipizzaner born in Canada and one unceremoniously retired with from one of the most famous circuses in the world that Simpson preferred not to name publicly.
“As I understand, the circus pulled off the road and gave them to someone who let them starve,” Simpson said. A friend knew of the “dumped” horses and a rescue operation began.
That leads to another way this story might have begun, again in Simpson’s own words: “Nineteen years ago I rescued a horse from the slaughterhouse in northern New Jersey.”
She lived in New Jersery for a year, just out of school, working for an oil company. Her dad had sent a small check for her to buy a bed with. “I bought that horse instead.”
He turned out to be a “lost” Lipizzan, his lineage unproveable, although Simpson did establish that he was of the Maestoso bloodline, descended along one of the five bloodlines recognized as originating with five stallions of the 1700s (a sixth line was established in the late 1880s). Pedigrees down through the 1600s were lost in a fire.
Foals’ names reflect their parentage, and a big chart could theoretically be drawn showing the family tree of all known and registered Lipizzans.
“That was the beginning,” Simpson said. “Lipizzans are like M&Ms. You can’t have just one.”
Her dad gave her her next Lipizzan. Then she bought a year-old stallion named Conversano II Destina, which she trained and showed and that became winner of multiple championships. By then she was back in her home state of Florida, competing all over the state, particularly in Wellington, which she called “the horse show capital of the world.”
He was followed by Allura and her filly Andiama. “There have been 20-something,” she said, including the top showhorse Pluto Dephina that Scott Simpson gave her the morning her mother, Dorothy DeBusk of Rich Valley, died.
“When the barn got that full, we packed up and moved to Smyth County,” to the Chilhowie farm. “This is the only place for sale that had enough room for the horses.”
In Chilhowie, Simpson took things up a notch. “When I got here I started assembling the best small herd of brood mares I could afford that had good show records and Delphina bloodlines or one that would be complementary to it,” she said.
The new home suits her and her Lipizzans. “Smyth County is almost identical to the Lipizzans’ native land—rolling hills, good hard ground.”
Lipizzans originated in Austria when it was controlled by the Hapsburg family. “Developed exclusively by the Hapsburg monarchy for its use during times of war and peace, the Lipizzan is the true horse of royalty,” said the Lipizzan Association of North America’s Web site. “The Hapsburg family controlled both Spain and Austria when the art of classical riding revived in Europe during the Renaissance. There was a need for light, fast horses for use in the military and the riding school. The Spanish horse, produced during Moorish rule by crossing Berber and Arab stallions with Iberian mares, was considered the most suitable mount because of its exceptional sturdiness, beauty, and intelligence. In 1562, Maximillian II brought the Spanish horse to Austria and founded the court stud at Kladrub. His brother Archduke Charles established a similar private imperial studfarm with Spanish stock in 1580 at Lippiza (nowadays: Lipizza [Italian], or Lipica [Slovenian]) near the Adriatic Sea. Here on the Karst plateau near Triest the type of horse which was bred in Lippiza was called the Lippizaner. Today in Europe the breed is called Lipizzaner or, in America, Lipizzan.”
Not every move or every decision affecting Lipizzans has been for their benefit. Their status as royal horses did not spare them from slaughter in war. “The breed has had a hard time,” Simpson said. “Every time there’s a war, they get eaten. That’s why their numbers are so low.”
Lipizzans are not the only breed to fall before fighting hordes. “There’s been a general decline in the number of horses, but especially hard hit was Lipizzans. The loss of a stud farm can wipe out an entire arm of the gene pool.”
General George S. Patton was famous not only for his leadership in World War II but for his efforts to save the Lipizzan from the ravages of war. In the United States, for years a single family owned all or most of the Lipizzans in the country. Simpson said it’s been only in recent years that the average person can buy one.
Simpson said people walking along Old Stage Road often ask her about her horses, sensing something separates them from the ordinary quarter horse with which most are familiar. “The have an aura of royalty about them,” she said. “From a baby to the last day, they have an extra presence and heart. People come here and say they never realized horses could have such personalities. My trainer used to say you should have a license to ride one.”
Lipizzans are highly intelligent, and demand the same from their riders. “They require a lot from their rider,” she said. “They require a lot of intelligence of their rider.”
Part of their allure, Simpson said, is that they are born black or bay and turn white, “sometimes snowy, sometimes fleabitten,” a patterning of darker spots done justice by the description, “by age six or seven. The rarest of all are Lipizzans that do not turn. That’s the rarest horse in the world, a colored Lipizzan, and we have one. At any one time there may be 20 in the world.”
They’re given special significance at the Spanish Riding School of Vienna, according to Simpson where the attempt is made to have one all the time. “Bad things happen at the Spanish Riding School if they don’t have one. Disasters.”
According to the Australian Lipizzaner Registry, a dark horse brings good luck to the school. “So far the old superstition, which says that one dark-colored horse should be kept to ward off disaster, seems to have proved true, as these horses have survived many wars, bombings, earthquakes and as recently as 1992, a fire at the Hofburg Palace where the horses are kept,” the ALR Web site said.
Maybe if Simpson had owned a dark Lipizzaner a few years ago, a bad experience with a gift horse would have turned out differently.
“I was given a Lipizzan by the Kennnedy family, but it was so mean, I had to give her back,” Simpson said. “She could run backward and double-barrel kick you. She was just evil.”
Neapolitano Millagra, Simpson’s dark Lipizzan, was born at Four Pillars last year where Simpson departs somewhat from the traditional goal of breeding for horses that range around 15 hands in height.
“I breed large stock,” she said. “I breed athletes to athletes. That’s not a good way to stay in the good graces of the Lipazzan world, but I breed for horses that are big enough for the average rider to be competitive in dressage.”
Dressage is French for “training” and is an ability for which Lipizzans are known: beauty and grace in all movements made in harmony with the rider.
So that operation in Chilhowie with the elegant sign out front with a logo Simpson created is not just a horse farm. It’s a place of appreciation and preservation of a rare and special equestrian breed.
“When you have a rare breed, you become a custodian of that breed,” Simpson said. “I’m still just an amateur. I’m still learning. I’m not one of the smart ones yet.”
And after a decade of experience with the breed, three years of building Four Pillars Farm— named for the architecture at the front of the house—Simpson said the farm is “about finished,” but her work with Lipizzans is sure to continue for years to come.