Horsin' around: Galloping Grandfather keeps on riding










And Snowman wasn't his only champion. De Leyer trained Show Jumping Hall of Famer Sinjon, who went to the 1960 Olympics in Rome.





Harry de Leyer and The Eighty-Dollar Horse author Elizabeth Letts will appear at Over the Moon Bookstore & Artisan Gallery in Crozet on de Leyer's birthday: Wednesday, September 21, from 6 to 8pm.


Always nice to read and remember those who get out there and do.

Agreed. Thank goodness there is a land use tax deferral policy that allows farmers such as this who obviously love their land and work to be a true steward of their property rather than be taxed into oblivion for pasture like it is development lots as some liberals( Democracy) would like to see happen. Pastoral views beats condo views any day.

So when does (please, anyone but Disney Studios) make this into a motion picture?

Seriously. Or is that Srsly? I love this sort of thing and am abashed that this is the third book and I haven't yet stumbled across the story yet.

I absolutely LOVE this story and Harry. He reminds me of my dad. I enjoyed the book so much....read it in one sitting and cried my eyes out at the end....even though I knew what was coming, it broke my heart. Like Harry, I felt like getting in my car and disappearing for two days. Thank you for this beautiful, inspiring story. I look forward to hopefully seeing Harry at a book signing on Long Island soon!! Xox

As a horse person, I can't help but enjoy these types of scrub to champion stories. As OT says, the can do animals and people. I also was born in the county when it really still acted like a county, and had to help with the cattle.It was a real working paying farm and operation like this horseman.

However, the number of real operators like this are in decline in the area, while more and more land sems to disappear off the tax rolls into conservation status. That's because not only does the land use basis need to be rewritten, the idea of conserving as a tool for sheltering the giant pleasure estates for the very wealthy, while the middle and lower pick up the costs the very wealthy utilize - like fire fighting - needs to end.

I don't think a single cow on a five acre lot should ever qualify, or a few bales of hay. That's playing a game. You either run a real working operation, or you don't get it. Conservation status can only be granted to properties that share the resource as public good. For example, the land is open to bird watchers and hikers, or it is owned by a charity that brings Vets out hunting, that sort of thing. After all, those hikers are subsidizing it, they should get to use it.

I question whether the Country Farmers of this world want to actully accept that the programms are modified to help real farmers, and real private charitable operations.