Riding High on the 4th of July

This picture was taken on the 4th of July 1970. I was riding my first horse "Bonnie" in the
Claremont 4th of July Parade in my hometown in Southern Calif. Our 4-H Club would always
enter our horses in the parade. This dress I was wearing was my grandmothers antique dress
she let me borrow. As you can see I was riding side saddle on a western saddle (which was sort
of hard to do.) My horse was a parade horse and was known to have been ridden in the Rose Parade years earlier. She would get very excited and prance in place. She also knew several tricks - she could bow, count with her hoof, laugh at my jokes, and shake her head to say "yes".
We are riding down main street (I can see one looker on)
Here we are riding in front of Pomona College where my parents went to college, met and got married and raised their family in their college hometown.
I got Bonnie from my neighborhood friend/riding instructor Pam Hart. When she went away to
college she gave me the horse which I kept in my backyard. I got Bonnie when she was 18 years
old and lived to be 21 years old. She was a great horse. I went on to have 2 other horses, "Popcorn" who was unbreakable and was sent to the rodeo by my trainer. And then I got Benjoe who was a really sweet Buckskin Quarter Horse. I'll write up a special blog on him. I also rode in the 1976 Bicentennial 4th of July Parade in Prescott, Arizona, while I was a camp counselor at Friendly Pines Camp. I taught horseback riding at the camp. Someday I'll get back up there to see the parade and go to the oldest rodeo in America.