Description
The Rea Swan Rocky Mountain Horse Collection contains a variety of newspaper clippings, correspondence, and organizational papers and publications from the Rocky Mountain Horse Association, a non-profit group that Swan and her husband, David, started in 1986.The collection is not the association's complete or official papers, rather they are the material culmination of the Swans' early personal and professional efforts to establish an official registry and keep a dwindling, and treasured, equine population from the brink of elimination.
The RMHA was created in the hopes of establishing the breed characteristics and registry for an Appalachian equine breed that was descended from a sire that appeared in Kentucky in the late 1800s. Sam Tuttle of Spout Springs Kentucky (Estill County) is credited with maintaining the desired characteristics while breeding his RMH stock during the 1960-70s. The Rocky Mountain Horse was established and recognized as a distinct Appalachian equine breed because of the efforts of the Swans, the RMHA, and other like minded horse enthusiasts who fell in love with the soft tempered and versatile breed of horse; Tuttle's efforts were not forgotten. The collection includes the association's by-laws and constitutions (both were adjusted as the association grew), organizational and some personal correspondence, the early RMHA minutes and committee reports, various publications from the RMHA and other related equine groups, as well as some financials materials from the group's early years.
