Critter Sitter's Blog: Misty of Chincoteague - and Why I Love the Island So Very Much

I have always been "horse crazy" and so was my Mother up into her 30s. Luckily she recognized my life-long obsession at an early age, and encouraged it as much as possible. Mom was born and raised on Chincoteague Island. The maternal side of her family traces back to some of the earliest settlers on Chincoteague and Assategue Islands, while her great-grandfather was a Danish immigrant who married into the Whealton family, and her father was a Swede who married into the Peterson and Tarr families. Most people on Chincoteague are related through generations of cousins inter-marrying, and my maternal side is the usual Teaguer mish-mash of intertwined relatives. (My Dad was an Oklahoma/Kansas farm boy who joined the Navy and was stationed at NAS Chincoteague.)
The book Misty of Chincoteague made the island famous. The "quaint" tradition of the pony round-up and selling of the youngsters had been written up in newspapers and magazines since the 1870s - and there are several old movie-theater newsreels covering Pony Penning prior to the book being published. Marguerite Henry visited the island of Chincoteague in 1946 during the annual Pony Penning festivities. When she made it known she was writing a book about the ponies, she was introduced to one of the private pony breeders on Chincoteague - Clarence Beebe. She visited the Beebe Ranch on the southeast tip of Chincoteague frequently during her stay at Miss Molly's Inn on Main Street. At the Beebe Ranch, she met Clarence's wife, Ida Whealton Beebe, and their two grandchildren, Paul and Maureen, whom the grandparents were raising.
While on the island, Maureen's favorite riding pony, Phantom, gave birth (on 20 July 1946) to a palomino pinto filly, sired by Clarence Beebe's chestnut pinto stallion, the Pied Piper. Marguerite Henry fell in love with the foal - and purchased her for $150 - with the promise of Clarence to ship her to Fort Wayne, Indiana when she was weaned. Ms Henry also promised to use the real names of the Beebe family in her book, and each of those four Beebes were paid $100 each for the use of their names. (Other than the fame from the books, this is the only monetary recompense that any of the Beebes ever received.)
Ms Henry worked away valiantly on her book, Misty of Chincoteague, and it was published by Rand McNally in 1947. In 1948, it won the coveted Newbery Award from the American Library Association. It is a fictional account of two siblings being raised by their grandparents on Chincoteague Island, and their desire for a pony of their very own. How the two children work hard and save up enough money to purchase the wild pony they see, followed by heartbreak, and ending with an up-lifting gesture of freedom has won hearts around the world. Misty became a celebrity, and Ms Henry took her to library conventions throughout the United States. She was taught to step onto a stool and shake "hands" with people wanting to meet her. She was also a useful riding pony, being ridden in English gear with a double-reined Pelham bridle.
The next book that Marguerite wrote about Chincoteague was titled Sea Star, Orphan of Chincoteague (published in 1949), after a visit to the island in 1948, where she witnessed the death of an orphaned foal.
In 1958, Ms Henry sent Misty back to Chincoteague to become a mother. Mares can be particular, and Misty was no exception - she fought off the advances of several stallions, and finally accepted the love of Wings in 1959. She had three foals with Wings in three successive years - Phantom Wings arrived in 1960; Wisp O'Mist in 1961; and Stormy in 1962. Phantom Wings was a palomino pinto like his dam; he produced only one known foal, a son named Sandpiper. The fates of both ponies are unknown. Wisp O'Mist was a solid chestnut mare, who also had only one foal, a solid palomino son named Cloudy, who was gelded. Misty's third foal was Stormy, born after the disastrous Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962. All of the ponies labeled "Misty family" ponies today are descendants of Stormy, a chestnut pinto mare with a small crescent moon on her forehead.
The Ash Wednesday Storm killed a majority of the ponies running wild on Assateague. Ms Henry immediately sat down at her typewriter and began writing Stormy, Misty's Foal, which was published in 1963. And children around the world started saving money and sending it for the replenishment of the herds on Chincoteague. A lot of people who had purchased ponies from the island previously gave them back so there would be wild ponies on the island once again.
In 1960, 20th Century Fox made a movie of Marguerite Henry's book - the movie was simply titled Misty. It was released in 1961, and was a quiet children's movie hit, but not a block buster. The movie starred Pam Smith as Maureen Beebe, David Ladd (son of Alan Ladd) as Paul Beebe, and Arthur O'Connell and Anne Seymour as Clarence and Ida (Grandpa and Grandma) Beebe. The movie had used trained Welsh ponies as the Chincoteague ponies; and the foal portraying Misty was a liver chestnut, who had to have her fur dyed on an almost daily basis.
With the Ash Wednesday Storm still a huge news item, the movie was re-released and Margueritr Henry and Misty made multiple appearances around the country, raising funds to replenish the ponies. It was a great success.
Paul Beebe, unfortunately, died from an automobile accident in April of 1957. He had finished a stint in the US Marine Corps and had just joined the US Coast Guard. Clarence Beebe passed away two months later in June of 1957. Ida Whealton Beebe passed away in October 1960, just after the filming of the movie. She never visited the film set. Maureen Beebe is still living on Chincoteague, but she shuns the spotlight. One of her daughters is a photographer and artist on the island, while the other daughter runs a charter Fishing boat service out of Puerto Rico, returning to Chincoteague during her off times. - Misty herself passed away in her sleep on 26 October 1972 at the age of 26. Stormy passed away in 1993, at the age of 31.
Through my Mom's maternal family, we are cousins to Ida Whealton Beebe. Mom used to walk from her home on Peterson Street down to the Beebe Ranch almost every Sunday afternoon in hope that "Uncle Clare" would allow her to do some chores around the Ranch and be able to ride one of his ponies with her cousin, Alma Beebe (Maureen and Paul's aunt). So I come by my love for Chincoteague ponies very legitimately. As a youngster, I rode Misty, Stormy, and Cloudy. Stormy's son, Thunder, took a golf-ball sized piece of flesh out of my back one day while I was grooming him. It took 38 stitches to close the hole, and I can still stick the ball of my thumb in it - almost 37 years later.
Even though Misty and her immediate family never actually ran wild on Chincoteague, there are currently six descendants of Misty running free on Assateague. All of the ponies were bred and born off the island, but were donated back to the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company (who actually own the ponies) to re-establish the Misty line on the islands. The following ponies were all sired by Walnut Hills Nightwind, a direct descendant of Misty: Beach Boy (a young stallion), and the mares and fillies named Sundance, Wildfire, Summer, Surfette (WH Surf and Sun) and Calendar Girl. Winter Moon, usually shortened to Moon, does not have a pedigree listed.

Maureen Beebe riding the Phantom: