*Ø* Blogmanac | Partners in Prison Pasture
By Mike Wise
Wallkill, N.Y.— About nine years ago, a chestnut thoroughbred named Creme de la Fete was assigned a new groom, Efrain Silva. He gave the horse antibiotics, scrubbed his mane and forelegs, dewormed him and, in Mr. Silva's estimation, prolonged his life for about three years. But when Creme, as he affectionately called the horse, grew old and weak, Mr. Silva was not ready for it. Creme had become his second family, the only living being he had any meaningful relationship with on many afternoons ... at Wallkill Correctional Facility, the medium-security state prison.
Through a partnership with the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, the [American] nation's largest and oldest thoroughbred-rescue operation, the prison has operated a work program for the past 18 years for inmates to care for the former champions, runners-up and perennial losers. Most of them no longer have practical economic value -- other than the $600 a meat buyer might pay -- before they come to a pasture in upstate New York to live out their years.
Some of the horses had been discarded, left for dead in their stables before being rescued by the foundation and turned over to the program's director, Jim Tremper, and his 18-inmate crew ... He said he had seen the thoroughbreds change the prisoners' lives as much as they changed the horses'.
"Especially the more violent guys," Mr. Tremper said. "A lot of them have intimidated people with their size in their lives, and they seem to respect the power and strength of the animal. It humbles many of them."
... Klabin's Gold, son of Strike the Gold and Splendid Launch, resides up the hill. Few horses represent the unseemly side of the industry more than he does. Klabin's Gold was found 100 pounds underweight with three fractured legs in December in his stall at Suffolk Downs, a minor track in Boston. His hooves were so long that the horseshoes had imbedded themselves in the bottom of his feet.
None of the prisoners knew of Klabin's Gold's past, just as the horse has no conception of the inmates' past. "Neither of them care," Mr. Tremper said.
Full text at NYTimes
By Mike Wise
Wallkill, N.Y.— About nine years ago, a chestnut thoroughbred named Creme de la Fete was assigned a new groom, Efrain Silva. He gave the horse antibiotics, scrubbed his mane and forelegs, dewormed him and, in Mr. Silva's estimation, prolonged his life for about three years. But when Creme, as he affectionately called the horse, grew old and weak, Mr. Silva was not ready for it. Creme had become his second family, the only living being he had any meaningful relationship with on many afternoons ... at Wallkill Correctional Facility, the medium-security state prison.
Through a partnership with the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, the [American] nation's largest and oldest thoroughbred-rescue operation, the prison has operated a work program for the past 18 years for inmates to care for the former champions, runners-up and perennial losers. Most of them no longer have practical economic value -- other than the $600 a meat buyer might pay -- before they come to a pasture in upstate New York to live out their years.
Some of the horses had been discarded, left for dead in their stables before being rescued by the foundation and turned over to the program's director, Jim Tremper, and his 18-inmate crew ... He said he had seen the thoroughbreds change the prisoners' lives as much as they changed the horses'.
"Especially the more violent guys," Mr. Tremper said. "A lot of them have intimidated people with their size in their lives, and they seem to respect the power and strength of the animal. It humbles many of them."
... Klabin's Gold, son of Strike the Gold and Splendid Launch, resides up the hill. Few horses represent the unseemly side of the industry more than he does. Klabin's Gold was found 100 pounds underweight with three fractured legs in December in his stall at Suffolk Downs, a minor track in Boston. His hooves were so long that the horseshoes had imbedded themselves in the bottom of his feet.
None of the prisoners knew of Klabin's Gold's past, just as the horse has no conception of the inmates' past. "Neither of them care," Mr. Tremper said.
Full text at NYTimes
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