Wild Horse Annie: Velma Johnston and Her Fight to Save the Mustang
Mustangs, the wild horses of the American West, are as much a part of the romance of the Wild West as the cowboys and Indians who rode them. The fact that mustangs still roam the public lands of the western states is entirely due to the efforts of one slim, small woman. Velma Johnston was born to a Nevada ranching family early in the twentieth century. Stricken with polio at age five and left disfigured, she still rode her father’s gentled mustangs and later married another rancher. Her life as a secretary and ranching housewife changed one fateful day when she pulled up behind a horse trailer that was leaking blood. Following the trailer, she learned the cruel fate of the mustangs within, one of which had been trampled to death by the others, as the rig turned into a slaughterhouse. The story of how Velma, snidely dubbed Wild Horse Annie by a government official, gathered supporters for the wild horses and got laws passed to provide for their humane treatment and protection makes inspiring reading. --Nancy Bent