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:

Misty was a rather small 12 hands high:

Misty and her first foal, Phantom Wings:

Misty and Stormy 2 months after the Ash Wednesday Storm - during the storm

Misty was "stalled" in the kitchen of the Beebe house:

** The first two photos are from the website Misty's Heaven  at   www.mistysheaven.com   **

A Nice, Quiet Weekend

For once, I had no other animals to care for this weekend, so the kits and I (and Beatrice) had a nice, quiet, pretty-much-at-home kind of weekend.  I read two books and started a third,and loved all of them.  Decades, a television station, showed a marathon of the old Peter Gunn series, and I got to enjoy the fantastic music of Henry Mancini all weekend.  I cooked supper for Saturday and Sunday - preparing Chicken Parmigiana, with mashed potatoes and buttered, steamed green beans with crunchy bacon bits on Saturday; I don't usually make mashed potatoes on back-to-back nights, but the pork chops I baked Sunday gave the makings of a rich gravy, so I fixed glazed carrots and mashed potatoes to go with them.  When I took the pork chops out, I put a nice pan of gingerbread in for dessert...  Everything turned out well.
   Nedi and Lovey were very content, as both Beatrice and I were home, almost the entire time, to wait on them and see to their needs.  Nedi wanted in and out onto the balcony, Lovey wanted to touch me at all times.  Nedi wanted chin scratching and stroking, while Lovey wanted to try eating everything that entered my mouth.  She discovered that while she likes the sauce that comes with baked beans, she does not like Tropical Blend Diet V-8 Splash.
  Yesterday afternoon Beatrice and I went to the cinema - the first time I've been in 18 months.  We saw, of course, The Secret Lives of Pets.  We laughed hugely at several points, and giggled through several others.  In scenes where the pets were in danger, I was like a small child, trying to lend them my strength.  Happily, it had a very happy ending and we left the theater feeling satisfied.  If you want to see a sweet, cute movie about pets, this is for you - even though there are a few scenes that might be a bit traumatic for very small children....
   Getting ready to go walk Rosie, and I'm watching the helicopters carrying dump buckets and the planes carrying fire retardant pass overhead on their way to the fire in Nederland...   sigh....

Wind, a Movie, Murders and Beer

We had high winds last night and this morning - currently we're having gusts up to 45 mph, but earlier they were up to 80 mph.  I guess that's when the hastily repaired privacy fence between Harvest Manor Apartments and the Millennium Harvest House Hotel came down again.  I was awaken multiple times by loud noises during the dark hours - and once I saw three panels of the fence were down and twisted, I knew that debris would be hitting my glass wall for as long as the winds continue.  I've been up since 6 this morning, and we've had three snow showers so far, though the snow melts as it hits the ground.  Lovey and Nedi have been happy to stay inside.
  Well, let's see...  a movie made about Mine That Bird, the 50-to-1 long shot who won the 2009 Kentucky Derby, will have it's opening debut show tomorrow at the historic KiMo Theater in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  Mine That Bird competed in all the Triple Crown races that year, finishing second in the Preakness, and third in the Belmont.  Distribution of the movie will spread out through the US from Mine That Bird's home state of New Mexico.
  The Mega Millions lottery is up to $400 million, if there is a single winner, in tonight's drawing.  Boy, what I would do with that amount of money...  It's mind-boggling to those of us who pinch pennies to make it through the month, with food always on the table and all other bills paid promptly.  I know that it's expensive to live in Boulder, but it takes money to move, also.  Just can't do it - yet.
  Back in 1996, little beauty pageant princess Jon-Benet Ramsey was found dead in the family basement, at the age of six years.  That house is once once again for sale, this time with a price tag of $1.98 million, here on 15th Street in Boulder.  -  And, a 58-year-old man is being arraigned on first-degree murder charges today (here in Boulder) for the death of Nathaniel Tallman, who disappeared from Lafayette on 28 January 2014.  Tallman's body was found and identified in Wyoming last week.  Tallman had arranged to meet Russell Britton to purchase marijuana the evening he disappeared. Britton stated that Tallman never appeared, but police found Tallman's blood and DNA in the back of Britton's van.  Tallman's car was found parked in Boulder three weeks after he disappeared.
  Small craft beers accounted for $14.3 billion in sales last year in the United States - that a growth of 20% from 2012.  I know there is a huge market for craft brews here in Colorado.  My niece's husband makes a couple of barrels three or four times each year; and local bars are very proud to sell local brews.  I had never realized how lucrative home brewing could be...  Of course, back before the industrial revolution, almost every single family (in Europe and North America) had their own beer or ale recipe.  Seems odd to me how it's popular again.
  (And it's snowing, again.)

Thoroughly Enjoyed a Movie

I am a big fan of J R R Tolkien.  I was introduced to The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings when I was 15, and I read both books (or all four) during the fall of every year.  Tolkien spent a great deal of time building and crafting Middle Earth, creating its history, and using his knowledge of ancient sagas and tales to bring his own world to life.  I am a great believer, too, that books - the written word - are much better than a film adaptation.  In the book, the author has control of the words used, and it is one's own mind that conjures up the scene the writer is offering.  With a film, one sees a specific person's view of that written work...  I usually like the written word much more than the cinematic representation.
   With the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy, much was cut from the stories, and a bit added.  With The Hobbit movie trilogy, a lot has been added, and a lot has been changed from the original story.  Characters who did not appear in the book The Hobbit appear in the films.  New characters are made up, and some of the story lines are changed.  I'm not too happy with that - as well as the fact that travel time is suddenly shortened without regard to the story.  But I do understand that directors of films must make a sell-able object, and that, these days, folks have a much shorter attention span and need multiple, quick-paced movement.  That being said, I actually liked the second part of The Hobbit movie trilogy, The Desolation of Smaug.
  It moved along well, almost too fast at times, and none of the dwarves were given much of a personality - indeed, if you didn't know which dwarf was which, you were pretty much out of luck.  You were able to recognize Thorin Oakenshield, Balin, and young Kili, who was wounded in the film, by the time the film ended...  But you felt nothing of the camaraderie that had grown between them and Bilbo in the 6 months that occurred during their journey to the Lonely Mountain.  Bombur just seemed thrown in for comic relief - especially in the barrels in the river scenes; his ordeal in Mirkwood (in the book) never happens.  Even with this grousing, I liked the second part of the film.  And it had to do with casting and acting - so my thanks go to:  Martin Freeman, Sir Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage, Ken Stott, Graham McTavish, William Kircher, James Nesbitt, Stephen Hunter, Dean O'Gorman, Aidan Hunter, John Callen, Peter Hambleton, Jed Brophy, Mark Hadlow, Adam Brown, Lee Pace, Mikael Persbrandt, Luke Evans, Orlando Bloom and Evangeline Lilly...  I also enjoyed the director's cameo at the beginning of the film.  I was quite surprised to realize that the Master of Lakewood was Stephen Fry.  And I looked in vain for Stephen Colbert in a cameo in Laketown; he is listed a a Spy for the Master in the credits, but he said that he, his wife, and children were a part of a Laketown scene....  Sorry I missed you, Colbert!

Misty (the Movie) Shows Free Next Week

Monday through Friday next week - Pony Penning week - the Island Theatre  on Main Street, Chincoteague Island, will show the 1961 film, Misty, at 11 a.m each morning.  The movie showing is free of charge, and tickets are available on a first-come, first-serve basis.  I was 5 years old when Misty, the film, was released, and I don't remember any year that I haven't viewed it.   The four main human characters - the Beebe family - are portrayed by Hollywood actors: Anne Seymour and Arthur O'Connor play Grandma and Grandpa Beebe, while Pam Smith and David Ladd (son of Alan Ladd) played Maureen and Paul Beebe. Duke Farley appears as Fire Chief Eba Jones.  Everyone else seen on screen in the movie is from Chincoteague Island, or nearby.  A picturesque farm in Onancock, on the Chesapeake Bay, stood in for the real Beebe Ranch; and trained ponies were the fill-ins for the original Phantom, Pied Pier, and Misty.  Most islanders own a copy of Misty so they can view family members in crowd scenes - I always look for Louise Bowden Gaskins in the race scene - she's in a blue dress and is standing by the racetrack rail, until she gives way for Maureen and Paul...    Enjoy the movie Misty in the Island Theatre, or rent or buy it to watch at home.  It's a great movie, and it reminds me of the Chincoteague Island I remember growing up on.

Opening night for Misty at the Island Theatre in 1961.