This has been a little over a year now but it is what prompted my passion for working with horses. It's what drove me to not work with just horses that came from top breeders with amazing pedigrees, it drove me to love the horses that people in the show world would probably consider defects. These horses are hurt, abused, or simply not perfect and this crash was a wake-up call to me that I couldn't wait for a dream horse to come along... Zach was my dream horse, despite his flaws. 

On October 27, 2007 a double deck semi-trailer containing 59 draft type horses overturned on Highway 41 in Wadsworth, IL on route to a sale barn in Minnesota. This barn is often visited by people who buy horses to slaughter them. These horses were on their way to be killed and as fate would have it, physics was on their side. The trailer was not built to hold 59 draft horses. 

However, it was a huge ordeal to rescue all of these horses from the trailer. I saw pictures and I tried to get my parents to let me skip school so I could go and help out with anything I could, if all it was would be talking to the horses to keep them calm. They couldn't die, horse slaughter is illegal in Illinois and just because of their size and the stupidity of the driver they got in an accident that was fatal to few but would save so many. 

A lot of people in the horse world would never want to touch these horses, they would see them as damaged and not workable. I felt like I was one of those horses, like people had given up on me before and so I wasn't going to let people give up on these horses, even if I was the only one still fighting. I had Zach but I wanted to adopt one of these horses because they needed another chance. Everyone deserves a second chance. So I volunteered at the rescue ranch they were taken to, HARPS, which nursed them back to health. 

I'm happy to report that many of these horses have been adopted and are doing well in their new homes.