These historic herds had arrived in Oklahoma through the “Trail of Tears”, the most sorrowful legacy left by President Andrew Jackson as he pursued a policy to forcefully remove Native Americans from their ancestral lands east of the Mississippi River to west of the river, into what is now Oklahoma. This journey of injustice not only included 46,000 people from the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee-Creek and Seminole tribes but their thousands of horses as well, with the Choctaw herd said to have numbered 15,000.
Bryant Rickman grew up riding Spanish Mustangs on his family's ranch near Speer, OK. He met Gilbert Jones in the late 1970’s and became his disciple for the preservation of the Spanish Mustang. In the early 1980’s Bryant and Darlene Rickman became stewards of the few remaining Choctaw horses living on Blackjack Mountain. A graduate of Texas A & M, and a retired agriculture teacher, Bryant has been a driving force for the Choctaw horse conservation, working tirelessly to ensure that this endangered strain of the Spanish
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Mustang would not become extinct. Throughout this period they worked closely with the renowned equine geneticist Dr. Phillip Sponenberg. Dr. Sponenberg’s findings reveal that while pedigree information is lacking in many feral herds, the original Spanish horses had been kept pure, especially in the Native American tribes.
BRYANT RICKMAN
While Dr. Sponenberg’s research is well documented he states “the historical record for the Choctaw Indian horses is extensive and more details are known for this strain than for many other strains of Colonial Spanish horse. But, they are surviving by a thin thread…perilously close to extinction.” The Livestock Conservancy has listed the Choctaw strain as “critical”; i.e., there are less than 250 alive today.
Photo by One Horse - Joe LaMere
Photo by Jennie Sweetin-Smith