Wild Horse Annie and the Last of the Mustangs: The Life of Velma Johnston [Hardcover]

If anyone goes through life and doesn't read this book, he/she is really missing something!

It is one of the best biographies I have ever read, and deeply, deeply moving.

We have here in Velma Johnston such a courageous woman who, in the face of all odds, both personal, social, regional and national, trudged on and on, year after year, almost all of her adult life, to save the Mustangs, and other wild horses, from extinction. That any exist today is due to her efforts.

As the authors state, we are reminded in this book that one individual person can make a difference.

I was a little dubious about its having two authors, as I couldn't fathom how a consistent tone and voice could be accomplished by two different individuals. Yet consistency there is, and the book does read as if written by one person, honestly, eruditely (the amount of research that has gone into it is stupendous), and compassionately. The painstaking writing of it took many years.

The authors do not shirk from painting a well-rounded picture of Velma Johnston (aka Wild Horse Annie) who, like the rest of us, was far from perfect. But the thought of her brings tears to my eyes, she was just so brave!

This is not an easy book to read because of the graphic descriptions of the torture of these beautiful animals by the callous, the insensitive, the greedy and the inhumane. Unfortunately, it is still going on to this day, and the authors point out the rescue efforts of Madeleine Pickens, wife of the billionaire, as being one of our greatest hopes at this time (her National Wild Horse Foundation website contains further information as to the present status of the wild horse, which is still in grave danger).

Many thanks to the authors of this book for their very successful efforts.

CODA: Despite pleas and even a lawsuit from Laura Leigh, Project Manager of Herd Watch, trying to prevent the scheduled Tuscarora Roundup in Elko County, Nevada, the BLM conducted a "gather" on July 10th that was scheduled to remove over 1,100 wild horses from the Elko County area. The gather started at 6:30 a.m. and by 9 a.m., the BLM contractor had gathered 228 wild horses. Subsequently, seven horses died due to dehydration and complications related to water intoxication during the removal process and/or at the holding facilities. In last winter's "gather" in the Calico Hills, 100 horses, as well as dozens of pregnant mares, died in one of the bloodiest mustang operations to date. On July 12th the BLM announced that it is temporarily suspending the Tuscarora wild horse gather. The work of Wild Horse Annie and her successor, Madeleine Pickens, goes on.

In 1966, well-known author Marguerite Henry wrote Mustang: Wild Spirit Of The West. With this book, millions of people became aware of the tale of Wild Horse Annie, who saved the wild horses of the West from slaughter.

Except, Henry took liberties with the history of Velma Johnston, eventually even claiming that she "owned the rights" to Velma's life (p. 261). The fictionalization of Wild Horse Annie was seemingly approved by Velma Johnston herself, writing "This clean, noble public image of Girl of the Golden West that I have become [via the book] is surely having a reforming influence on me" (p. 176).

So what WAS the history, and story, of Mrs. Charles C. Johnston, aka Velma Johnston, aka Wild Horse Annie? Authors David Cruise and Alison Griffiths painstakingly researched the voluminous archives, including the correspondence written by Velma Johnston herself. The evolution of Wild Horse Annie into a free-roaming horse activist, then into a national celebrity, is a most interesting tale. And it is a tale best understood in this book, Wild Horse Annie and the Last of the Mustangs: The Life of Velma Johnston, and not Marguerite Henry's version.

Velma Bronn was born in 1912, and in 1923 she contracted polio. The disease and the initial treatment (a full body cast) left her disfigured and in pain for most of her life. However, she persevered with her studies (and her love of wild horses), eventually getting her dream job - to be an executive secretary.

Cruise and Griffiths write, "One spring morning in 1950 the trip [to her job in Reno] passed uneventfully until she caught up with a livestock truck" (p. 42). To say that the next few hours were eventful for Velma would be an understatement. What she experienced changed her life in profound ways. The livestock truck was full of bleeding, injured, and dying wild mustangs, bound for slaughter into pet food.

One result of this experience eventually became the passage by the US Congress of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971. What happened between Velma's original experience with a mustang roundup, and the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act, is the the main substance of this book.

Here are a few of the tidbits I found interesting:

In an editorial for the "Reese River Reveille" newspaper, editor Jack Taylor wrote in 1959 that, "The true picture of a wild horse is a runty, moth-eaten, mangy little scrub critter of no value anywhere outside a can. He is a curse to the stockman, a nuisance to the big game hunter and a pain in the neck to the Bureau of Land Management whose job it is to see that the open range is properly apportioned to feed all living animals dependent on it. Getting him out of the picture as far as possible can be likened to a housewife's zeal in getting rid of cockroaches in the kitchen and moths in the clothes closet" (p. 127).

Over 50 years later, there are still those who would agree with Taylor. However, there seem to be more that agreed with Velma Johnston, that there is room for wild horses, and that they have a right to be present, and unmolested, on public land. "My commitment to the wild ones is total," she wrote (p. 255).

After her retirement as an executive secretary, her employer, Gordon Harris, wrote to Velma, "The world is made of of three kinds of people - those who make things happen; those who watch things happen; and those who don't know what's happening. Go, girl, go! And remember this is the first day of the rest of your life. You belong to the first group so keep on making things happen" (p. 255).

There are many heroes and villains in this story of Wild Horse Annie. There are people and organizations who were very supportive of Velma's work (Christine Stevens and the Society for Animal Protective Legislation, for one), and those that chose to exploit her efforts for their own agendas and purposes. And authors Cruise and Griffiths go beyond the development of Velma, the animal activist. This is also a tender love story, of Velma and Charlie, of Velma and her friends, and of Velma and Hobo, her horse.

This is truly an extraordinary, well-researched and written biography of a unique individual. And the true story is really more amazing than the fictionalized one written by Henry.

As someone who has loved horses since she was four years old, and knowing the joy of adopting one or more of the wild mustangs of Nevada, I cannot recommend this book enough. In large part because it tells the story of Velma Johnston 'Wild Horse Annie' who in an era of no Internet, as well as a society where women were not known for or accepted for fighting as hard as men for a cause they believed in.

Maybe being an eight generation California family and coming from the west where we would see the wild horses as we crossed rural areas here in California and Nevada, I have that memory branded in my mind and the beauty and glory of the vision. Or maybe its the idea that like Velma I understand that people can pretty much choose where they want to live in this vast land, but wild horses and other wild native creatures have no choice. And because of this we need to protect them from being killed in any way.

Bear in mind she didnt succeed over night in getting the wild horses protected. It was a work that took shy thirty years, and was often done by her alone, with no outside help. Its not an overstatement to say/suggest that Velma was the Martin Luther King of the wild horse movement.

And the photos are wonderful!