By Jane Simmons © 2004

Only two museums in the world are exclusively dedicated to preserving the history of the American Saddlebred Horse and promoting a better understanding of the breed: one is in Lexington, Kentucky – which opened at the Horse Park in 1985 – and the other is in Mexico, Missouri – which opened in 1970.

Since its official inception in 1966 and the completion in August 1970 of its new building, the Missouri museum’s growth and success has flourished under the guidance of devoted local community leaders. The group’s efforts over the years can well serve as a matrix for others interested in establishing a horse museum in their communities.
Its story started in 1966 when the Audrain County Historical Society’s leaders selected several of their dedicated members to help guide the not-for-profit organization’s plan to honor Mexico’s favorite title – “Saddle Horse Center of the World” – with a museum dedicated to the American Saddlebred Horse.

Sarah Janet Nesheim, the first and only chair of the Society’s horse museum committee, was directed by its Board of Directors "to make it happen." She is the last of “the original committee members, who included: Irma K. Rogers and Nathalie Godfrey. The project depended largely upon Irma’s many years of teaching equitation and knowledge of horses, owners and handlers,” Jan told me, and “Nathalie’s research expertise.”

She told me Betty (Mrs. Bob) Hook, Hilda (Mrs. Leonard) Hook and “Ollie” (Mrs. Arthur) Simmons also helped over the years. Jan told me that my mother had “loaned the museum a number of silver trophies for dedications and was always available with a helping hand.” The museum has Irma’s double sidesaddle in its collection, the one she used for on-horse teaching of riding.

For the horse museum committee’s meetings, “we used the Bride’s Room on the second floor of the Society’s mansion,” Janet said. “The little room also served then as the display area for our comparatively small collection of horse items,” until the museum building was built as a part of the Society’s museum facility.

St. Louis-based Saddle & Bridle magazine carried in its June 1966 issue an article about the proposed museum and then-Editor Virginia Powell called for support for it. The magazine’s former owner, “Bill Thompson, came to the Museum following its construction and helped us with various valuable suggestions,” Jan noted.

This committee of horse lovers “worked ceaselessly to create support for the American Saddlebred Horse Museum as part of the Historical Society’s 11-acre antebellum mansion complex” perched on a hill on the small town’s west side, according to Dana Keller, who currently directs the Society’s publicity and marketing program.

Before the Civil War in the mid-1880s, “General Ulysses S. Grant was a visitor in the Ross family’s home, now known as Graceland. The Society has restored the mansion with authentic period furnishings and filled it with archival mementos depicting the history of Audrain County.” It was dedicated on May 13, 1961, Dana said. “By January 1964, the Society had 600 members.”

Dana said the property had been purchased for $35,000 in September 1958 from owner Sam P. Locke, with the Society paying $10,000 for the house, and Mexico paying $25,000 from its recreation funds to create a new city park on Graceland’s grounds.

“The first official mention of the horse museum in the Society’s Minutes was November 29, 1966, when it was reported that $6,756.39 was in the proposed museum’s fund,” Jan pointed out. By the “following month’s Minutes, the fund had increased to $12,500,” she noted. “A Kansas City Philharmonic concert and Missouri Arts Council support” brought in “$2,040.25 earmarked for the Horse Museum in 1966.”

“In January 1968, the Board commissioned Kramer & Harms Architects of St. Louis,” Jan said, “to draw up the planned building in keeping with the historical architectural period of Graceland” and to attach it “by a walkway to the north side of the mansion.”

Jan said: “in October 6, 1969’s Minutes, the Board voted to approve $40,000 for Rheinhardt Construction Company of Centralia to build the museum, without a basement.”

Also helping in garnering museum support was Nancy (Mrs. Jack) Atkinson of Fulton, Missouri, and Martha Staley of Mexico. “Nancy accompanied Mrs. Walter Staley to Lexington, Kentucky, to an American Saddle Horse Breeders meeting.” They presented “the idea and a picture of the proposed museum, and solicited funds from the group.”

The Breeders’ contribution plus some local funding “produced the $40,000 required to start construction of the museum.” In those early days, Jan said, the museum committee worked “every day including Sunday afternoons to create the best museum possible.”

The “door key to the new American Saddlebred Horse Museum building was turned over to us on January 5, 1970.” The following month, Jan “was appointed Chair of the committee that was to create the collection which would convert the new empty building into a display-filled museum.”

Thanks to “local newspaperman, L. Mitchell White,” the Society had a “vast collection of Currier & Ives prints” for inclusion. He “had been housing this collection and hundreds of boxes of horse artifacts and memorabilia in an airplane hanger at the Mexico airport,” Jan said.

“The University of Missouri’s Director of Displays offered suggestions to us for special museum effects, and we solicited help too from the Missouri Historical Society for proper display techniques. We were committed to displaying ONLY items that could be identified,” Jan emphasized. She encourages everyone, as she has since 1970, to “come see this fantastic educational and historic collection.”

The “Preview Dedication was held on August 8, 1970,” and “the Official Dedication of the Horse Museum was the following week on August 16, when U.S. Senator Stuart Symington gave a speech,” along with other dignitaries, Jan noted.

A hallowed site on the Society’s grounds is the official grave of legendary black stallion, Rex McDonald. Actually, what is buried there is the famous horse’s stuffed hide.

Rex McDonald 833, out of Rex Denmark and Lucy Mack, lived and was shown both in Missouri and in Kentucky.

Foaled in 1890, he was sold at four months for $105 to Mexicoan R.T. Freeman. In 1893, the stallion won the Audrain County Fair’s $800 stake and the $1,000 Mexico Spring Stallion Stake in 1894. Later that year, he was sold for $3,050 and sent to Kentucky, according to Mexicoan Leta Hodge’s book – A Gathering of Our Days.

In 1898, Rex McDonald was purchased for $5,000 by Colonel F.W. Blees of Macon, Missouri, and stabled at the Lee Brothers barn on West Boulevard (later to be known as Arthur Simmons Stables). The stallion was bought for $6,500 by a St. Louis man, and was shown by Mexicoan Bob Hisey, who kept Rex at his stables, Mrs. Hodge wrote.

In 1903, the famous stallion was honored as the Champion Saddle Horse of America at the St. Louis Fair. He was retired by a Columbia, Missouri, owner. Then, in 1910, Mexico trainer Ben Middleton paid $2,750 for the 20-year-old horse and rode him at special events seemingly to the delight of the old stallion, according to Mrs. Hodge’s account.

Rex McDonald died in Mexico in 1913. His hide was stuffed and displayed in the lobby of the Mexico landmark – the Ringo Hotel. When it burned in 1918, fire fighters saved Rex’s remains. Tom Bass took the stuffed horse to his barn where people could still see it. Finally, in the 1930s, the remains were buried at the Fairgrounds. At the opening of each year’s Audrain County Fair, the audience stood in silent tribute as a wreath was placed on the stallion’s grave near the inside quarter stretch of the race track.

The horse’s remains were moved to Plunkett Park when a school was to be built at the Fairgrounds. When a school was started at the Park, Rex’s “body” was moved across town to Graceland in the front yard of the Saddlebred Horse Museum. A simple stone marks the site today.

Horse Museum Curator Jan Nesheim was born in McCredie, Missouri, on August 30, 1929, the daughter of Jesse Boone, Sr. and Edith Virginia Baber. Her father was a descendent of Daniel Boone. Her parents lived in the tiny community that today is part of the area known as the Kingdom City junction at I-70 and Highway 54. In 1929, “they were putting in Highway 40 at that time.”

She “grew up loving animals,” and “from childhood, I was around horses of one breed or another,” Jan told me.

Her father, at the time of her birth, “was a blacksmith, who shod horses, created machinery parts and repaired all types of farm equipment.” Earlier in his life, “he traveled for International Harvester and Shapleigh Equipment until he wanted to have a more settled home life.”

Jan has “one brother, Jesse Boone, Jr., who is 13 months older and currently lives in Mexico.” She arrived as part of her father’s second family; when she was born, she “had one half-brother and one half-sister, both of whom were grown.”

Interestingly, “my Uncle Jack Harrison wrote my bible on horses,” called Famous Saddle Horses & Distinguished Horsemen.” She said: “He may have been the first equestrian trainer at Stephens College” in Columbia, Missouri. I found in the book some fabulous old photos and an extensive history of horses and people from the mid-1880s to the early 1930s. Mr. Harrison, in a note in the front of the book, dated June 15, 1933, gave permission for using its information if “proper credit is given this publication.”

In 1933, her father “moved the family to Hatton,” where she “grew up with two Draft horses but we didn’t ride them.” Like most families, “we attended the Audrain County Fair every summer and thrilled to the magnificent horses that showed their stuff at the show.”

Jan “attended Flint School near Hatton.” She “was graduated from the Fulton school system in 1947” and “worked as Secretary to the President of the Callaway Bank there.”

In 1953, Jan “joined two college friends in St. Louis” to attend night school at Washington University. She was “working for the Dr. L.D. Le Gear veterinarian pharmaceutical company run by his son, Daniel.” She “lived in University City, going to the college classes by streetcar.” On a vacation in 1957, Jan “traveled with a girlfriend to Havana, Cuba.” Both girls “were surprised and a bit frightened by men with machine guns atop the Presidential Palace, as we sat in the park writing cards to friends. It was the beginning of the revolution.”

When traveling home to visit her family on weekends, she “would ride the Wabash train between Delmar Station and the Mexico depot.” It was on one of these trips home that Jan’s life moved into a very different direction.

Her mother had an appointment with the family doctor one weekend when Jan “arrived with a sore throat.” Her mom convinced her “to accompany her for an appointment with osteopathic physician and surgeon, Dr. Harold Invold Nesheim.

Even though, “I had known Dr. Nesheim all of my life as one of my family’s doctors, my heart did a flipflop” when “he walked into the room that day,” Jan revealed.

Dr. Nesheim told Jan he traveled to St. Louis “frequently” and asked if she “would be interested in going to the city’s next Field Trials” during “quail time” in February. After all, he said, she “might meet some potential ad buyers for her veterinarians’ drug publication.” Jan said “Nesh” was “President of the Missouri Open Championships for several years.” He “also was on the Board of Directors of the National Amateur Field Trial Clubs of America,” as well as many other related organizations. “Bird-hunting was his hobby and he pursued it all of his life.”

He called Jan and they “rode horseback together at the Trials in the spring of 1958.” Soon thereafter, he asked her to marry him. Dr. Nesheim, “was a widower with one daughter Martha.”

The “wedding was held in St. Louis on June 2, 1958, at Westminster Presbyterian Church” where Jan “was a choir member. “He and Jan had no children of their own. They “were married 40 years, until his passing on February 2, 1998.”

Living on acreage across from a huge lake on the south edge of Mexico, they “always had horses in a paddock there” and at their “80-acre farm five miles out in the country.” Over the years, they “owned a Celebration championship-winning Walking Horse called Royal – a roan with four white socks and a diamond-shaped marking on his nose.” His owner had asked the Nesheims to retire the horse to their place. They also owned “several field trial horses.” Jan told me they “also bought a three-gaited – Fairview’s Captain – at one of local horseman Bill Cunningham’s sales.”

Jan “led a Girl Scout group for several years on Mounted Patrol Drills, and on trail rides” that were “directed by Butch Early over the grounds of the A.P. Green estate nearby.”

The Nesheims kept “white quail” and “exotic birds, including Lady Amhurst, Golden and Silver Pheasants.” Her husband, “as a Field Trials and bird hunting judge, held such events in Canada and Mexico, and supervised many others around the country, including Hawaii,” she said.

When they married, Dr. Nesheim “already had been a member of the Historical Society for a number of years” even “before the group owned Graceland.” Also active in the Society were other Mexico leaders: Robert Green, who served as its first President from 1953 – 1963, and then Bradford Brett, L. Mitchell White, Martha Staley, Robert M. White II, Charles Stribling, Louis Boyes, and Jan (who served from 1981 – 1986). Seven other Mexicoans have held the title since Jan’s tenure.

In its 34-year history, the Horse Museum has hosted many events, thereby opening its displayed collections to even more people, who are free to tour both museums.

In 1990, for instance, the museum proclaimed August 3 as “Chat Nichols and Arthur Simmons Day” and inducted Mexico’s hometown horsemen “into its Hall of Fame of the American Saddlebred Horse Museum.” Missouri Governor John Ashcroft’s letter of congratulation to each man “was read to the crowd, along with a proclamation from the City of Mexico and Mayor George Irion.” A buffet “reception followed the ceremonies,” which were conducted on the Museum’s porch.

In 1999, another big event “was a Tom Bass Celebration event held in conjunction with the unveiling of the famed horseman’s bust in the State Capitol’s Rotunda” that is filled with those of other distinguished Missourians, Jan said. The then-Speaker of the Missouri House of Representatives Steve Gaw, “who is a Saddlebred Horse owner, led a three-day trail ride from the Mexico Saddlebred Horse Museum to the Capitol in Jefferson City” as a part of the commemoration.

As for Jan, she said, it has been a “perfectly wonderful adventure” and “a highlight of my life. I am honored to have been a part of the creation of the Museum that helps to preserve the history of the exquisite American Saddlebred Horse. It’s been a dream of a lifetime for me.” She encourages everyone, as she has since 1970, to “come see this fantastic educational and historic collection.”

You may contact Jan Nesheim in care of the American Saddlebred Horse Museum, 501 S. Muldrow Street, Mexico, MO 65265 and also wish her a Happy Birthday or through the Museum’s Director, Dana Keller, by phone: (w) (573) 581-3910 or her e-mail: dkeller@audrain.org

You may contact Jane Simmons, who lives in Central Florida, where she is writing a book about her parents, Art & Ollie Simmons, via her email: simmonsbook@hotmail.com.