The Horse That Swam Away (1965)

The Horse That Swam Away

Walter Farley, il. Leo Summers

1965, Random House

Tena wore neither saddle nor bridle, and there was only a light halter on her head. Yet Tim could guide her with no trouble at all. She would run for miles and miles if he let her. There was scarcely a day that they didn't go fifteen miles down the beach and back.

Scant months earlier, Tim's family had moved south to a beachfront house on a remote Florida key for his father's health. To make up for his losing his friends, his parents gave him the Arabian mare Tena, with whom Tim has clearly established an instant, perfect bond.

One day the pair's usual adventures - herding a school of mullet in the shallows, fighting a nurse shark hooked on a fishing line, galloping along the beach - turns dangerous when Tena follows a porpoise out to sea. Desperate, Tim trespasses on the territory of a reclusive Native American named Billy Roundlegs, only to discover that Billy shares his trouble - the porpoise is his own runaway pet.

A very simply written book which doesn't approach the quality of the series for which Farley is famous, but then it is clearly intended for a younger audience. His love for the unique natural world of Florida is clear in every line, and the most compelling feature of the story.

Living in Florida wasn't the same as living anywhere else. You wouldn't have any fun at all if you were scared of things that might hurt you.

The horse-in-peril plot is a common one, but this slant - a horse swimming out to sea, at the mercy of the ocean and the predators therein - is unusual.

This book appears to have been based on a story Farley told his youngest child, a boy named Tim. The family had a home in Florida and owned Arabians, including a mare named Al-Marah Athena.

Horses

Al-Marah Athena "Tena" - chestnut Arabian mare

Related

Al-Marah Arabians and breeder Ruth "Bazy" Tankersley are big players in the Arabian world in the U.S. Her breeding program, based on stock purchased from the famous Crabbet stud in England, helped make this particular line of Arabian horses extremely popular in America. There is a book about Al-Marah, And Ride Away Singing - the Breeding Philosophy of Bazy Tankersley and the History of Al-Marah Arabians by Mary Jane Parkinson.

Links

Venice, Florida library - Walter Farley Literary Landmark

Mikasuki (Miccosukee) Indians

Al-Marah Athena's pedigree at Pedigree Online

Equine Vision magazine article on Al-Marah Arabians' history

Webcast of Al-Marah breeder Ruth "Bazy" Tankersley speaking on Arabians

Illustrator - Leo Summers

1925-1985

Summers specialized mostly in sci-fi magazines and adventure stories, but did a surprising number of horse books.

Horse books

Five True Horse Stories by Margaret Davidson

Wild Boy by Thomas Fall

Runaway To Glory by Alice E. Christgau

The Wild One by Eve Bunting

A Horse For All Seasons by Sheila Kelly Welch (short stories)

Saddle A Thunderbolt

Saddle A Thunderbolt

Jo Sykes, il. Jo Sykes (cover)

1967, Funk & Wagnalls

"I guess everybody's tried to catch him at one time or another... He's running with a wild sorrel mare, though, and I do mean wild. She's got a brand, but I bet she hasn't seen the inside of a corral in twenty years. Trying to trap her is about like trying to catch rainwater with a sieve. And Rival's become just like her."

A year after his rancher father broke his back, 17-year-old Bruce Hubbard is alone on the failing family spread. His dad's having another operation, his mother is keeping him company and his brothers are tending their own families. It's up to Bruce to keep the place going in the meantime, but he has a string of bad luck. First he loses the family's prized racehorse, Buttermilk, whose reliable winning of the annual Cowboy Race each summer helped the ranch stay alive despite pressure from the neighboring Heart Seven Ranch to sell out. Then he has a fight witht he Heart Seven's owner, Ross Adams, and his spoiled son Wesley, over their attempts to capture the wild Arabian stallion Rival.

Rival lay less than fifty feet beyond the spring. The ground beneath the stallion was worn bare and looked as hard and smooth as a concrete sidewalk. The deadly lariat still encircled the once sleek neck. The hulk of Wesley's saddle lay in a clump of brush, lodged between two boulders.

Events bring Bruce into ownership of Rival, but he soon has cause to say "If things ever break right for me, I won't know how to act." Twists and turns put Bruce ever in hopes of having a mount for the race - but the mount keeps changing.

Very much a western, but more horse-oriented than many westerns. Injun and Old Sorrel, a cagey wild mare, are particularly vivid. Bruce makes a nice, stoic fledgling cowboy who, with the help of the slight but powerful cowboy Dandy, stands up to the truly unpleasant Adams clan and works to rescue the ranch.

Interesting training methods are used to break Geronimo of lashing out with his hind legs; I don't know how realistic or humane they are, but they're convincing. As is the need for some training.

The farmer took off his shapeless western hat and sailed it at the gelding's rump. Quick as lightning, the horse lashed out with both hind feet, stopped the hat in mid-air and slammed it back across the corral. "He doesn't just kick; he aims," Tucker said. "I believe he'd kill a man if he could."

Of course, it all comes down to a most unusual race.

Although relatively flat, it was not the kind of race course that would appeal to breeders of Thoroughbreds. Here and there the gravel of an old river bed came through the thin soil cover. Dry washes and scattered patches of brush created hazards known only to the range-bred horses.

Horses

Injun - black mare

Buttermilk - dun gelding

Pluto - bay gelding, pack horse

Bedouin Chief's Rival - 12-year-old bay Arabian stallion

Old Sorrel - sorrel mustang mare

Carousel - palomino gelding

Geronomio - 4-year-old buckskin gelding

Sundowner - 5-year-old

Sinner - sorrel gelding

Ben Blue - grey stallion

Little Bee - mare

Scamp - yellow shepherd dog

Other Books - horses

The Stubborn Mare 1957

Chip On His Shoulder 1961

Trouble Creek 1963

Other Books - dogs

Wolf Dog Of Ambush Canyon 1959

Leashed Lightning 1969

About the Author

Jo Sykes was born in American Falls, Idaho, and bought her first horse as a teenager. She worked as a cattle hand for ten years. She settled down near Livingston, Montana, where she was a a founding member of the Gallatin Dog Club and breeder of Smooth Fox Terriers.