The Harley Hackamore

WHO DUN IT??  I call this set the Harley Hackamore because I first saw it on a Harley D Zip.  It was marketed as having been made by... ... Susan Bensema Young.  Me.  Shock!!  Talk about being flummoxed!  Something just wasn't right.  The claim that I had made it hovered on the edge of believability in the worst way, sending me scampering back to my scrapbooks.  But I couldn't find it!  Had I, or had I not, made this set??!!  I've lost track of pieces before...

Nothing would solve the mystery except a closer look, preferrably in hand.  In an excess of luck I managed to purchase the piece.  Truth at last:  I had not made it.  Thus was born this post, which will closely examine this newfound and incredible piece of model braidwork, and compare its work to mine at six different places or parts: interweaves, brow conchos, buckles, tassels, snaphooks and mecates.  What a splendid chance to educate the public.  Of course, it also hopes to answer the question:  WHO DUN IT??

The story begins last fall (October 2015) with an ad in MH$P.

The phrase 'double take' describes my actions well.  I did indeed 'take' more than once.  I saved the 2 Harley pictures, printed them out, wrote to the seller, stared at that thing I can't tell you how many times.  The set appeared to be of very high quality.  Its design and color choice was exactly like something I would've done.  The workmanship and execution, however, made me pause... were what grabbed my attention in the first place.  The pure-rawhide braiding was too thick... too coarse...  the mecate was wrong, too simple.  But mecates can be replaced -- easily retied!!  Last, first and most, the whole thing looked like it had painted interweaves instead of my standard braided ones.  I've never done painted ones.  The heel knot, in particular, I could not remember making...
Oh, I was confused, not to mention exasperated!!

 This is a good view of the 'braided-and-wrapped' approach of the pure-rawhide (central) parts of the breastcollar.  The buttons were formed from 3-strand-braided sinew, then cut in short sections and wrapped around the lace, and glued down.  This method gives a fine appearance of scale-model braided rawhide, and is mentioned in my Guide.  But TSII tack doesn't use it...

Everybody in the model-tack-collecting world should know that these two scrapbooks exist.

 Here we see the Grey (1979 - 2005) and the Brown Braidwork (2006 - Current).  Within the historical limitations of no camera until 1983, and only gradual growth of record-keeping by picture until about 1991, they document every piece of model braidwork ever made by the Timaru Star II (TSII), me.  Digital camera technology entered in 2006 and printing my own pictures entered in 2010.  I am always referring to these priceless records (like, for blogging!).  When I couldn't find this hackamore and breastcollar set in either the Grey or the Brown, I knew I had a real mystery case.

The seller told me it had been sold to her by old hand S. Taylor, a tackmaker I'd known for decades, and who said it had been made by me.  Certainly I trusted Taylor -- she had no reason to lie.  The mecate, the seller thought, came from her hand.

Photo-shooting this piece was a pleasure.  Its yellow-gold-and-black color looked best on a golden-with-black horse, and I found a saddle in my collection which matched beautifully.  This saddle (above), with its dense glued-on edge braid, is by Kathy Wiggins circa 1998.

So let's take a closer look at the Harley Hackamore, and compare it with what is known about TSII pieces.  First and foremost, look at the interweaves (zigzag contrasting rings in braided buttons).  The Harley has painted (or drawn-on) ones, done in a color exactly matched to its dark brown mecate.  It is a supreme example of this technique.  Painting allows terrific crispness, perfect spacing and sizing, and gives more zigzags than would be possible using thread.  Of course it's easier!  The blue arrows point to especially clear examples of painted interweave rings.

Now take a look at the TSII's Fancy's Hackamore with its actual braided, or woven in, interweave rings.  The effect of braided thread is more 3-dimensional than drawn ones.

The Harley has a single pair of brow conchos.  They are by Carol Williams of Rio Rondo (thank you Carol for establishing such a high standard!).  While the TSII did use these conchos, such pieces are rare (and old).  Mostly I used etched Rio Rondo conchos, and after about 2008 I started making my own, either from hot-fixes or from actual metal (aluminum or silver). [Al or Ag]  Most, if not all, of my hackamores contain metal beads or crimps of some sort... the Harley doesn't.
Another sure clue is the buckles.  The Harley's buckles are classic S-shaped ones:

The TSII almost always uses wire ones in which the ends have been looped over, or, as the Guide names them, "double-looped" friction buckles:

Since September 2001, the TSII nearly always uses twisted-wire buckles:

The same double-looped ends are visible here as well (blue arrow).
The Harley Hackamore has a California style tied-knot browband.  When the TSII employs tied-knot browbands, there is almost always a pair of tassels on their tips.  I say "almost" because there have been cases where there weren't tassels!  (Portraits!)  But with a set that has this much detail and knotwork effort, (this much psychic work) I would almost certainly have put in tassels.  To me they feel required after a certain level of detail has been reached.
Fancy's Hackamore:

Here's an example from 2002, fourteen years ago:

Tied-knot brow tassels, braided interweaves, handmade twisted-wire double-looped buckles:  they're all there.  (TSII #425.)
Another difference with the Harley Hackamore is the snaphook.  It clearly has the soldered Rio Rondo hook:

I have never used these hooks... I can say that with absolute certainty.  The TSII uses plated spring-type snaphooks on its martingales:

This time I've chosen an example from twelve years ago (TSII #441).  Note the buckle: hammered handmade double-looped wire.  Since the martingale is hiding under the horse, not as much effort goes into its buckle; sad but true.  : )
I have mentioned that the Harley Hackamore's mecate is a big clue.  Assuming it is original, could it have been by me?  Did I ever make 2-color twist (as opposed to 2-color braided) mecates?  According to the Grey scrapbook, I did... but only in 2001, and they looked quite different.  They had a braided-thread strand for the contrast:

On the left is a hackamore that went to Karen Grieve of England; on the right, a hackamore that went to Angela Giddings of Oregon.  Matching breastcollars, aye...  TSII mecates such as these had braided buttons on their tassel ends and leather poppers on the tails.  Much better to look at my oldest mecates, prior to 2000 when I learned to spin thread:

(Both of these went to R. Nikolaidis in Germany.)  Obviously braided, not spun.
So, WHO DUN IT??

I have looked long and hard through my collection of pictures of other people's tack (snatched off the web: I confess: but we try to carefully label).  I have contacted other tackmakers and gotten responses.  I will continue to do so.  I can guess at those who did NOT make it more easily than I can guess who did, and here are some whom I think (or know) did NOT make the Harley Hackamore:
Heather Moreton
Danielle Hart
Jacquee Gillespie
Ulrike Appelt of Germany
Evelyn Munday
Donna Allen

Here is my list of those who MIGHT have made it.  It includes model braiders active long ago who might have gained more experience and skill as time has gone by.  The "long shots" are just that, folk whom I believe would have a slim, but just possible, chance of having created it.
Chris Armstrong
Emma Harrison
Kelly Maurer
Kim Smith

Linda Spiesschaert
Emily McFadden (long shot)
Lauren Islip (long shot)
Susan Monty (long shot)
Suzanne Adams (long shot)

In the course of writing Taylor a letter, inquiring about this hackamore (I can't find any email address for her), it came to me that the most likely answer is the most obvious, most common and yes most frustrating.  Most likely (oh, I hate Occam's Razor -- he has cut me so many times!) she simply forgot, and, casting about for a famous name whose work looked like this, landed on me.

It is a beautiful piece, and I am lucky to have it.  If it's this good, why are they claiming it was made by somebody else?

Anonymous has made the most model tack pieces of all.

The Florida 8 and the Econlockhatchee

 I promised a post on our 2015 Florida trip and its horses.  Here are the eight (!) who came along, plus a few shots of Riverfront Property (Quelle Surprise in matt app) on the Econlockhatchee River, and then two of just the river.  I have more post subjects than I can keep up with! but we'll start here.  Riverfront's performance is becoming standard (we have seen him before; he was featured in my Christmas letter).  The CollectAs, on the other hand, surprised me at every turn.  These few pictures, taken after we got home, do not do justice to the new patterns and unexpected behaviours being laid down by them, my latest obsession...

I blame Margaret for my involvement with CollectAs.  This is her eBay store:  The-Grey-Woods-Cat   She is a neighbor who happens to've sold me all my CollectAs.  (We met over the matter of a Breyer moose off eBay.)  I wanted a grey driving pony; when I saw the grey Hanoverian stallion (below), I knew I had found him.

 I now have a dozen CollectAs, but the Florida 8 contained only three.  "The Florida 8" refers to the eight models I took with me to Florida this past holiday season.   Wittingly, or... not... 

I could also point to new stable blankets, but alas this subject needs to wait and have a dedicated post later.  Suffice to say that I haven't yet found a source of blankets to really fit CollectAs -- faugh -- so, come on hobbyists!

 Since time immemorial I have taken 2, occasionally 3, Traditional scale models with me on road trips.  This has necessitated taking 2 Stone Horses boxes stuffed into the middle of the back seat.  Space is at a premium on trips.  This past Christmas, bowing to a pressure more felt than seen, I changed my mind and took only one Stone box.  If you line them up just right, a Trad like Riverfront and a pony like Versalox (above) can fit inside together.  The space savings inside the car was surprisingly wonderful!! and highly praised.  Three CollectAs, plus a Classic foal (one of my congas is Classic Foal molds), squeezed themselves into 3 small pony pockets. Thank you Lori B. for inventing pony pockets!!  I could stow these somewhere else entirely -- in my backpack -- and that made all the difference.  Light weight, no bulk, no worries about breakage.  New ease in slapping them onto dressers and refrigerators at night, new speed in packing up in mornings, new ideas for tack all came along with them.  A herd within a herd, they exchanged blankets and pockets with elan.  I've got to find a wife for Graf the grey...  So that accounts for 6 of the eight.  Never before had I taken so many horses on a trip!  But there was more to come.

I also took my blanket kit box.  Readers will remember my post on making cross stitch saddle blankets:  Blanket Kit

 Somewhere in the course of the trip, I opened it up and was utterly astonished to discover two MORE stowaways!!!  The second one (small black colt) is nestling just at the bottom of the plier handle.

 I'm not normally a chinahead, but I collected these little Bone Chinas when I was a kid.  I have about two dozen stashed away or standing on the curio shelves in the downstairs bathroom.

Talk about being nonplussed.  Whether I'd picked these up at BreyerFest (already broken) and placed them in the blanket kit box for safekeeping (being a handy hardshell case); or whether I'd packed 2 of my own to take to Didi's show and have a fellow artist/remaker repair them... I couldn't remember.  Up until now I didn't know.  But now that I'm staring at them, I'm pretty sure it was the former.  I already have 2 of the black foal.  One of them is in one of the greatest model horse stories I've ever experienced, a tale across time... but again, alas let's wait and dedicate later!!

So there's my Florida 8:
Riverfront Property  Quelle Surprise in matte bay appaloosa
Versalox who's already had her own post Sergeant Reckless  and whose husband is named Siltsox Siltsox in Ironton
Azucar the Knabstrupper mare (Spanish for sugar)
Skyrie Alaqu the bay Andalusian stallion (his name is an anagram of Squeaky Rail, a restaurant near the hotel I stayed at for Didi's show)
Graf the grey Hanoverian
Jasper the Classic Foal  (he came on the trip hoping to find a name, which my husband bestowed upon hearing his name used to be Banff)
Bay Bone China stallion
Black Bone China foal

They didn't all get canoe rides. : )  That privilege goes to horses that float, or, in the case of CollectAs, horses that are replaceable.  In all cases they have to be in a pony pocket.

 The Econlockhatchee River is in northern Florida, flowing into the mighty St John's.  It is a great attraction to airboats.  The airboats explain the jury-rigged flag on the canoe.
Like many waterborne horses, Riverfront looks for firm ground when he finally comes ashore.

Firm ground not being in the offing, he likes to try climbing trees.

Not bad.

Once he's got his land legs back, he's willing to wander along the shore.

Methinks this horse has got the right name.
The little black dots on the sand are snails.

But all too soon it's back on the water.
These cypress roots are a somewhat unusual sight.  The soil has washed out from around them and they stand exposed in all their wacky, writhing glory.

The Econlockhatchee was one of our favorites, and we'll be back.

Sergeant Reckless

A wonderful thing happened on the way to Florida...  We visited the National Marine Corps Museum! in Virginia (Dec 19).  It's absolutely free, there's plenty of parking and it's open every day except Christmas.  [Ahem: Closed thru March 2016, to hang a Dauntless.]  Once we drove in the main entrance, we turned hard left and went up a gentle hill.

It was a snapping cold day and we had the place to ourselves.  In this opening shot there is a great deal: the stone walls, the top of the museum just showing through the leafless trees -- it looks like a strange upside-down funnel -- and, just in front of it here, a stone plinth with a statue.  I for one was pleasantly surprised.

I had not expected dogs here, let alone such noble depictions of them.  I'm sorry to say I don't know the sculptor/sculptress of this bronze beauty.

What a great honor guard!

This lovely animal certainly set the tone of our visit.

He is forever on guard, in a most appropriate spot.

There was another dog statue not far away.  (Museum roof in background.)

There is that in me which can freely admire these magnificent animals.  My husband is deeply afraid of them, and as a result I have almost no contact with the real thing.  Yet this amazing guardian struck me as very realistic.

Two dogs down, we wandered slowly along the forested walk.   Everywhere were monuments, obelisks, tombstones and statues of soldiers and the gear of war.  The very bricks lining the walk had names on them.  I kept looking around.  I had tried very hard to locate exactly where on the grounds the famous statue of Sergeant Reckless was, but without success.  We walked for what seemed a couple of furlongs... it was very cold.

 In the same quadrant as Caesar the dog was a stone chapel and a ship's bell.  I was pleased by the bell but did not dare ring it!  Solemnity is easier when it's cold...
There is another connection in my life with the Marines:  the band.  (I was a music major, trombone.)  Coming round another corner I spotted a musician's memorial.  Again I was pleasantly surprised...  (and this was before I got inside, where I discovered much MUCH more about the Marine Band.  But I digress.)

Where the dickens was that horse??!!!?  It was cold... and we'd almost reached the point where we could see everything there was to see on this walk.  She had to be here!  And then it happened:  a quick glimpse of a distant shape and suddenly I felt warm.

(I struggled with this one in PhotoShop.)

There!  In the distance, down by the road.

With success sure, I settled down to enjoy the rest of our outdoor walk.  I was seeing things I hadn't known existed, such as methods for engraving marble that looked for all the world like photo-transfers.

The Museum is in the midst of installing 9-11 memorials.  Here is one of them, containing actual material from the site:

In such a place, surrounded by monuments and tombstones, by memories and history and deeds, it helps to 'focus down' on just a few.  "Find yourself some words and take 'em home."  One of my favorites was this 1967-1968 stone.

I would have changed the wording a tiny bit (pass instead of pass on, to eliminate the double on) but it certainly works as is.

Finally in the right frame of mind, I stood in front of it and turned to the right.  And there she was.

It was a good setting and a good preparing, all those monuments.  She is solemn, herself a memorial.  The whole place is a temple, an outdoor temple, something I had only read about up to this point.

Big as life!  a good deal larger.

The lighting was excellent.  As a photographer, I struggled to keep my batteries warm.
Of course Versalox was having the time of her life.  Every model in my herd -- if they are lucky -- gets one moment -- an encounter, an episode -- that defines them forever.  This was hers.

 I had read the book, and knew that the author, Robin L. Hutton, had scratched her initials on the statue close to the near hind hoof during the wax stage.  I found them.  (Just below Versalox' front feet, with a heart.)

People (not me) had laid roses on this bronze.

The sculptress is Jocelyn Russell.

I have mentioned the light.  I couldn't help but notice that the shadow of Reckless was tremendously photogenic.  Time was passing, the light was changing, and everybody wanted to get inside where it was warm.  But this chance was perfect and I could not pass it up.  "Paso Por Aqui" -- passed by here -- So this is my triple portrait of the three of us:

Taken twice because both angles were good.

Rest in peace, my lady.


Oh and it was a GREAT museum - !!  Everybody ought to go to this one:  it's absolutely free, there's plenty of parking and it's open every day except Christmas [but closed thru March 2016 to hang that Dauntless]...