MERRY SOUVENIR #530553

From Franne Brandon, Petersburg, Tennessee
Reprinted with permission from the Heritage Walking Horse Association Highlights

In February of 2018, Sharon Loomis Corr, a good friend and supporter of IHWHA, passed away. Sharon was part of a New York state family involved with Tennessee Walking Horses since the 1940's. In her will, Sharon bequeathed her collection of antique magazines devoted to the Tennessee Walking Horse, the American Saddle Horse, and other gaited breeds to the International Heritage Walking Horse Association.

The article appearing below on the great show mare of the fifties, Merry Souvenir, came mostly from one of the magazines in this collection. This 1959 issue of National Horseman appeared four years before the establishment of Voice of the Tennessee Walking Horse. IHWHA is grateful for the gift of this collection and will provide photos and insights into horses from those early years as time goes by.

MERRY SOUVENIR 530553

In early summer of 1952, a minimal black sabino daughter of Merry Go Boy was put in the court of her half-brother, the classic roan stallion Go Boy's Souvenir. Merry Go Girl T. was out of a mare named Jane Ann by Curry's Sunshine by White Lightning. Her second dam was Ada Abernathy by Billy Allen. The following spring Go Girl foaled a filly registered as blue roan. The filly was a classic roan, like her sire. She would receive the official name of MERRY SOUVENIR 530553.

Merry Souvenir was highly successful as show mare. In 1956, she won the Junior Championship Walking Horse Stake. In the first three decades of the Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration, The Junior Classes were for three-year-old horses. It was not until 1966 that four-year-olds became Junior Horses, and a separate set of classes was added for three-year-old walking horses. Merry Souvenir had competed in the Junior Mares class but lost out to Big Man's Vamp. Vamp had also won the Two-Year-Old Fillies class and the Two-Year-Old Walking Stake in 1955. As the reigning JuniorWorld Champion, Merry Souvenir was the mare to watch in 1957, and she proved up to the competition, as she was chosen the top mare in Walking Mares, Four-Years-Old and Over in 1957, for owner J.B. Sapp of Martinsville, Virginia. She placed third in the World's Grand Championship that year, behind Sun's Jet Parade and Setting Sun, who would win the World Grand Championship honors in 1958.

By 1959, Merry Souvenir had changed hands, to the ownership of J.M. Foster of Gary, Indiana and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She was campaigned that season by the veteran trainer Steve Hill of Beech Grove, Tennessee, who had taken the great Merry Wilson to most of the victories. A full-page ad for Merry Wilson in the August,1959, issue of The National Horseman reads, in part. "126 blue ribbons - a record worth remembering, for it will be a hard one to equal - have been won by a great six-year-old mare, Merry Souvenir, world's junior champion, world's champion mare. She started out
this year, again in winning form, taking top rating in the mare division and championship stake at Tampa and Largo, Florida, Columbia, South Carolina, Aiken, South Carolina, St. Louis, Missouri, Lexington, Kentucky, Knoxville, Lebanon, P.-T.A. Show, Shelbyville, Manchester, Tennessee."
(page 78)

In her column in the same issue, Jean Hunter, Editor of "Tennessee Walking Horse News", writes "...The story of this famous champion is almost like a fairy tale. She was started as a youngster by Winston Wiser. At that time, J.B. Sapp arrived at Steve's stables, in search of a top horse to take on the winner's circles. Steve and J.B. spent days riding around looking at prospective show colts, and after they had made the rounds, they bought Merry Souvenir, then ready to show in her junior year. From then on she has made history." (page 66)

She continues "Steve showed Merry Souvenir for J.B Sapp to win more blues than any horse showing for many a day. She has more show ribbons than any living mare, and possibly she had done more winning than the noted Merry Wilson, also made famous by Steve." (page 66)

That year, in 1959, Merry Souvenir was once again World's Champion mare, and placed fourth in the World's Grand Championship stake, behind Rodgers' Perfection, reserve World Grand Champion Go Boy's Invasion, and third place Mister Sensation. There were seventeen entries in the 1959 World's Grand Championship Stake, more than in many stakes in the 21st century.

Unlike some competitive and winning show mares, Merry Souvenir successfully transitioned to broodmare status. Eleven foals were registered to her from 1963 to 1975. Her first three were blacks by Midnight Sun. Midnight Souvenir C. sired 28 foals. Sun's Souvenir C. had no offspring, while her only filly by Sun, Mama's Moon Glow, had two foals. Her fourth foal was another black one by Go Boy's Royal Heir, a filly registered as Royal Heir Souvenir, which had five foals. Her fifth and sixth foals were chestnuts sired by Suns Eldorado. Eldorado's Souvenir was a gelding, while filly Eldorado Bella Donna continued her dam's legacy with nine foals. Her first roan foal was The Midnight Hour C., a gelding by Eldorado's Big Star. She also had two black foals by Eldorado's Big Star, Big Star's Souvenir, a filly who produced fifteen foals, and Eldorado's Big Lick, a roan with no offspring. Merry Souvenir's last foal was a black classic roan by the 1973 World's Grand Champion Delight Bumin Around. Bum's Souvenir was never shown, but stood at stud for many years, siring 105 registered foals.

Many of today's classic roan horses trace their roan legacy through Bum's Souvenir to Merry Souvenir, to her sire Go Boy's Souvenir, and back to his dam," V". Although many of Bum's Souvenir's foals were out of Ebony's Hacksaw mares, others were out of mares with no modern show bloodlines. Merry Souvenir was an old show mare with talent, stamina, show ring presence, and a classic roan coat that is in vogue in today's pleasure circles. Some of her descendants are IHWHA registered, carrying on her tradition as strikingly handsome examples of the Heritage Walking Horse breed.