Monday, May 15, 2023

Inspired Not Just By Islam: Gladys Brown Edwards' "Classic Arabian Stallion" Trophy



I'm not really a fanciful person. But lately I've almost felt like the spirit of author, artist, and Arabian horse expert Gladys Brown Edwards (1908-1989) has been looking over my shoulder, whispering, "Tell about that thing that happened. Tell that story!"  That's because I keep finding examples of her art, and am compelled to look up the stories behind them.

Original Quarter Horse pencil sketch, signed "Gladys Brown 1947,"
found at an estate sale several years ago. 

Although I never met Gladys, I keep passing through the long shadow cast by the woman so well-known in the Arabian horse community in the last half of the twentieth century that they just called her "GBE."  

Gladys Brown Edwards horse with Western tack,
found at an estate sale by the author

I'll find a piece of her artwork at an estate sale, or read an article on her, or peruse her correspondence and look at her scrapbooks in the collection of the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library (WKKAHL) at Cal Poly Pomona. And I get the quiet nudge: "Now tell that story!" 

Miss Gladys Brown,
in the 1948 edition of Here's Who in Horses of the Pacific Coast

In this post, I'm ultimately going to tell the story of the time that Gladys sent a metal horse through the mail to a very important friend, and how the horse did not make it to the recipient intact. 

I've told many of Gladys' stories in my horse-related blogs in the past. About her designing Boston Terrier dogs for the California pottery, Hagen-Renaker, Inc., and meeting the quiet equine artist Maureen Love, who is little-known outside the model horse hobby.

Source: Hagen-Renaker Online Museum

About Gladys designing a trophy/bookend for the Morgan Horse Association of the West.


About bringing Gladys' large original painting of the great Arabian stallion *Orzel from Arizona to WKKAHL just before the pandemic brought the world to a temporary halt in 2020.

About watching someone buying one of Gladys' life-size fiberglass Quarter Horses, produced by Prewitt's, at an estate sale, tying it to the top of his car, and taking it home. 


Three weeks ago, I found an example of an Arabian horse US Nationals Trophy at a  regional estate sale. I told his story in a blog post (link below).


Two weeks ago, I traded for a pair of Arabian foal bookends by Gladys Brown Edwards at a model horse collectors' gathering.

Their story is pretty straightforward. The foals are marked on the base "Dodge, Inc. Gladys Brown 1946."


Each foal is about 7" tall at the ears, and 6.25 inches wide at the base. Interestingly, they're about the same scale as the Arabian US Nationals trophy I'd found at an estate sale the weekend before. The adult Arabian trophy design originally dates to 1968. 


I had recently seen another design by Gladys of two Arabian foals  at the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library (WKKAHL). It's in the collection of materials from the US Army Quartermaster Remount Depot in Pomona, California -- site of cereal magnate W. K. Kellogg's famous Arabian horse ranch. Gladys drew these foals for the cover of a printed program for an event celebrating the Pomona Remount's second anniversary, in October 1945.

Arabian foal illustration by Gladys Brown (Edwards), in the collection of 
the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library, Cal Poly Pomona. Photo by the author.

A year later, in 1946, GBE's  Arabian foal bookend designs were copyrighted and produced by Dodge, Inc., which issued many of her other metal horse designs. 

So, three weekends ago, I found the US Nationals trophy -- designed by GBE. 

Two weekends ago, I found the Arabian foal bookends -- designed by GBE.

And this past weekend, I found one of GBE's "Classic Arabian" trophies at another estate sale.  

Here's the story I feel like I'm "supposed" to tell now. 

This particular trophy was in trouble. At some point in the past, it had been damaged. Two of its three "down" legs were broken at the ankle, and the metal base under the hooves had come loose from the wooden base that held the plaque commemorating the winning horse's award. Knowing its backstory, I took pity on it and brought it home.


The trophy design dates to 1946. Gladys and her then-husband Cecil Edwards called it the "Classic Arabian Stallion."


When the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library at Cal Poly Pomona had their "Becoming Gladys Brown Edwards" exhibit a few years ago, they showed one of the trophies with photos of its prototype. 

Photo by the author of a display in "Becoming Gladys Brown Edwards,"
W. K .Kellogg Arabian Horse Library, 2016-2017.


It's common to hear this piece referred to as "Islam," because the owners of the real stallion Islam, the Payne family, used the trophy top to market their horse, who was foaled in 1939.



Some online sources repeat the story that the stallion Islam was the inspiration for the GBE "Classic Arabian" trophy, but that's not the whole story.

Letters from Cecil Edwards, Gladys' then-husband, in the collection at the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library explain that Gladys used several Arabian stallions to make this composite design. One was addressed to Mr. Kellogg himself, and is dated 1946.



Another letter, dated 1950, explained to Forrest Mars (of chocolate fame) that the Classic Arabian Stallion design was influenced by "the most impressive Arabian horses that were available" to Gladys at the time, including Islam, *Lotnik, Alyf, and others.



Islam (b. 1939, Gulastra x Nafud)

*Lotnik (gr. 1938, Opal x Mokka) (Polish)

Alyf (gr. 1938, Ronek x Fath)


The name of the metal GBE design might be confusing to model horse collectors, since Breyer also called one of its plastic figurines the "Classic Arabian Stallion." The two horses are roughly the same scale, but the difference in design (and material) is obvious. 

Gladys Brown Edwards "Classic Arabian" (1946), left;
Breyer "Classic Arabian Stallion" (1973), right

Breyer licensed the Hagen-Renaker, Inc. 1958 ceramic design for "Ferseyn," by Maureen Love, to produce their own Classic Arabian Stallion in 1973.

Breyer Classic Arabian stallion, left; Hagen-Renaker "Ferseyn," right

Ferseyn (gr. 1937, *Raseyn x *Ferda) 

Top-heavy, balanced precariously on three tiny hooves, 6.5 inches tall (off the base) and weighing in at almost 3.5 pounds by himself (without the base), the GBE Classic Arabian is rather tippy and prone to breakage. 

This is evident in a letter from Cecil and Gladys Brown Edwards to the influential English Arabian horse breeder, Judith Blunt-Lytton, 16th Baroness Wentworth, in 1948, a copy of which is at WKKAHL. 

The couple had mailed one of the "Classic Arabian" trophies to Lady Wentworth. She had written to tell them it had been damaged in the post. Her letter is not in the WKKAHL collection. (Note the misspelled the name of her stud, Crabbet Park, in the reply.) 


So Lady Wentworth, Gladys, and Cecil would have understood just how prone the "Classic Arabian" trophy top is to being broken, as was the one I found at the estate sale. 

The trophy was very popular among Arabian horse lovers around the United States. Here's a photo showing one of the trophies being awarded to Radamason in Michigan:


Here's a clipping from the Pomona, California Progress-Bulletin in October 1948, showing one of the trophies, mounted on an elaborate base, being used as the W. K. Kellogg Perpetual Trophy of the Arabian Horse Breeders of Southern California. 




Another collector has contacted me asking if she can obtain my broken Classic Arabian from the estate sale so she can restore it. Given its graceful design, and the piece's history, I know it will be well worth a try. 

____

For more information on Gladys Brown Edwards and her art, here are some links:

The "Finding Aid" for the Cecil and Gladys Brown Edwards Collection at the W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse Library, which contains a good summary of her life and career:  

GBE "Farana" cowboy and horse design, part one:
Part Two:

Quarter Horse trophy designs by GBE:  

*Orzel painting by GBE:

Prewitt's fiberglass Quarter Horse:

"Parade Morgan" Bookends:

Morgan Horse Club of the West Trophy:  

US Arabian Nationals Trophy: 

Gladys Brown Edwards, Hagen-Renaker, and Maureen Love:  




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