Jean Vasiloff knows her horses. The owner of McCullogh Farm in Old Lyme and breeder of the Whippoorwill line of registered, purebred Morgan Horses, hopes more people will share her love and appreciation for the first truly American breed.
Close to 1,000 people, a record number, took up Vasiloff’s offer, attending the Old Lyme horse farm’s annual open barn over Memorial Day weekend. For three days each year, she literally throws open the doors to her barn, letting people come see and experience Morgan Horses, some of which are just days, or hours, old.
As usual, Vasiloff and others around the farm got very little sleep the week or so before the open barn. There were five newborns, two colts and three fillies, to show off this year. One of them was born just the night before the open barn started. Two others were born days apart earlier in the week. Another two mares are ready to foal at any moment.
Vasiloff is committed to producing, promoting and perpetuating the strengths of the original versatile Morgan horse. Morgans are known for their intelligence and agility, as well as their powerful, compact and sturdy bodies and sound legs, well-suited for fast reining and cutting work, as well as stylishness for dressage and as carriage horses.
The breed is named after Justin Morgan, a Vermont horseman who owned the foundation sire of the tough little horses that New England farmers relied upon. They had stumps to pull, rocky land to cultivate and people who needed to travel long distances and get around mountainous terrain, either on horseback or by stage coach.
Few people may realize that the original stock dated back to 1772 and the farm of Judge George Grant McCurdy of Old Lyme. Years later, in 1927, Warren McCulloch, an neurophysiologist, bought 600 acres for his wife, Rook, to run as a summer camp. That’s where their younger daughter, Jean, learned to ride horses. She decided Morgans were the breed for her.
Jean married Alex Vasiloff and in 1945 started a horse breeding farm, naming it McCulloch Farms and advancing the Whippoorwill line of Morgan horses.
In the 1950s and 60s, Jean, Alex, and sons Christ and Tony were active with the American Morgan Horse Association. They participated in the major shows and club trail rides around New England. The farm hosted the Whippoorwill Horseman's Club for over a decade.
The farm is now 500 acres, 450 of which are protected from development by a conservation easement with the Nature Conservancy. Alex and Tony are deceased. Christ lives on the farm. About 15 to 20 people volunteer to work around the farm and with the horses and there’s a steady stream of people who have bought horses from Vasiloff coming back for lessons, training or to visit her.
Vasiloff has 30 horses on the farm, including an 11-year-old palomino stallion, Triple S Gold Dust Correll. She estimates there are 300 offspring of the Whippoorwill line, most which were sold as weanlings.
Whippoorwill Morgans have become polo ponies, police horses and working ranch horses. McCulloch Farm has produced Grand National Champion and Open Competition Champions in dressage, carriage driving and hunter pacing. Although Vasiloff no longer shows her horses, she said many owners do. Their horses have been top-rated 4-H hunter/jumper competitions and national, regional and state champions in hand, saddle seat and western pleasure and show driving.
Vasiloff has written the Hum N B Hill books, a series of 15 children’s stories about horses that are based on and around the fictional farm located in Pachaug State Forest. Some of the horse events in the series are based on true stories of her life with horses; others are pure fiction. She also has written articles for the American Morgan Horse Association and other horse breeding publications.
The horse breeding has always been run as a business, not a hobby, she said. Teaching people how to care for, as well as ride and enjoy their horse, has always been part of the equation.
Some people who come to the Memorial Day open barn are so captivated by what they see and experience that they become horse owners.
Now 78, Vasiloff admits that some day she’ll have to cut back on the breeding program and focus more on horse boarding and training. The addition of a large new riding arena over the winter, behind the old wooden barn where stalls for all of the mares ring a small working area, helps move the farm in that direction. The new galvanized steel framed structure will allow horse training to go on year-round, regardless of weather, she said.
“What pleases me is that I put up a poster to offer a class on horse ownership, not horsemanship,” she said. “Six people signed up over the weekend.”
The classes will teach people how to approach and handle a horse and all the aspects of caring for the animal.
Two women, Erica Robb and Debbie Hensen, who have both worked with Vasiloff for almost 40 years, are business partners with her. Eventually, Vasiloff’s granddaughter will inherit the farm.
Robb has been coming to the farm since 1969, when she was nine years old, a member of a horsemen’s club. She trained her first horse when she was 10, and credits Vasiloff for teaching her most of what she knows about horses. After going away for college, raising a family and working at a therapeutic riding program in Virginia Beach, Va., Robb has returned to Connecticut.
“The open barn is really good for helping people to hit that relaxation point,” she said. What she observed a couple of years ago is that people first arrive all focused on the schedule of what they will see and do with the horses.
“By the end of the day, they are just sitting, talking or not. They get the hang of it. The farm has always been about more than doing things. It’s as much about relaxing enough to see what you’re looking at,” she said. Some people come back a couple of times over the three days, enjoying views of the pond and trails through the farm.
Robb said the farm plans to offer more clinics and workshops for horse-oriented people, new and existing horse owners.
“Jean has always been very good at helping a new horse owner, helping them learn what to do and how to care for the animal,” she said. Plans include courses providing information about nutrition, different tack and how to train for a higher level of performance or showing horses.
McCullogh Farm is open to the public year-round, free of charge. Vasiloff estimates at least 2000 or 3000 visitors from all over the world stop by each year. Its next big event will be the annual Morgan Horse Versatility Event, where students and owners put on performances with their horses.
For more information, see www.whippoorwillmorgans.com