Page 16 - IDHSNA 2016 Annual Blarney

The Annual Show that Wasn’t

our enormous thaNKs go to Jan & rob robertson— maybe regional shows would be a wiser course? We could have a
Jan is show committee chair; tom green—show man- fruitful discussion on this matter on the IDhsNa official facebook
ager; mary hansen—show secretary; Debbie feemster page!
and toni Bessler—hospitality; Debbie Weakly-Bryan—sponsor-
ships; laurie monroe—show Program; Debbie cresci—stable the 2016 Inspections were still held at the show venue,
manager; fleur Bryan—course Designer; ann morss—liaison; having twelve horses applied to be inspected there. the
lucy stevenson—Inspection coordinator; and Barb mccarthy report on the inspected horses can be found in this year-
and the wonderful staff at the majestic farm for all their hard book.
work during the months leading up to the 2016 annual show.
so much time and effort was poured into the production, start- running the inspections under the harmonized rules was very
ing in march when Jan & fleur volunteered to head up the initial educational and we thank charlotte moore and george chapman
work of finding a venue and forming the show committee. most for traveling from Ireland to officiate.
of the 2015 show committee stepped up to help as the show
would be held in the North east region in cincinnati, ohio. the 2016 IDhsNa annual show committee
Jan did all the leg-work--- Judges were locked in, the hotel was
found, the annual banquet venue was procured, just to get the
project off the runway.

sponsors chimed in with many donated dollars for classes
and trophies, advertisements were set up for paying
advertisers, silent auction Items were collected, volunteers
were signed up, the prize list was created and mary entered the
horses & owners who planned to come. We had a very minimum
of entries headed into the last month of the show, and a spec-
tacular show program was designed by laurie that is available on
the annual show website. When a few owners had to drop out
for one legitimate reason after another, the entries dropped to a
number that would not allow for the show to continue. It was a
heartbreaking decision to cancel the classes a week before the
show was to start. all entry, sponsorship, advertising and ban-
quet monies were refunded, (there were several members who
donated their money back to the show and we are very appre-
ciative for these generous souls!) leaving the show in the red as
some money had to be spent early to have everything ready for
the show. We ran the silent auction through the 32auctions site
to defray some of these costs and because generous members
wished their Items to still go for bidding! the silent auction
raised $939.50, which will help to balance the show expenses.

We need to evaluate the value of running the annual show---the
shows have made money in the past due to successful silent
auctions and generous sponsors but the show should be about
proudly showcasing our horses and providing the springboard for
competition among our own----

14 IrIsh Draught horse socIety of North amerIca | 2016 aNNual BlarNey eDItIoN