It was a sunny fall afternoon in 1999. It was my first year of retirement with no more eager, new seventh-graders to face—the first time in 34 years. I stopped in at TRI's former location on Joy Road, a place I'd been passing for a number of previous years on my chestnut Morgan, Robbie, when we lived out in the country nearby. Now we lived in town and Rob was boarded. My enthusiasm for horses - tracing back to my grandmother's stories of her youth and a driving horse named Trixie, would never wane. I couldn't imagine a better way to spend newly-found time than something involving kids and horses.

A few of today's volunteers may remember the place, with its port-a-potty out back (yikes it was cold in winter!). Somehow I'd missed its transition from Saddlebreds to TRI. Most of today's volunteers have only known our present 5-star horse palace. I went to the office, and luckily, Joanna Featherman, then the office manager, was in. I left with a stack of acknowledgement letters to donors which no one had time to address. I can do that, I'd volunteered. A newly retired English teacher should be able to handle this. And so I started.

The letter-writing morphed into barn work a couple mornings a week that winter (since there were no orientations scheduled till spring) and my lifetime of stall cleaning experience was in demand. Then came the need for someone to organize and run the food booth at the annual 4-H horse show, proceeds from which went to TRI. I took on the assignment until that project ended. By then I was volunteering regularly in classes as a leader. When our very first horse actually purchased by TRI for the program (Dobbs, the handsome chestnut Morgan still working for us), I assisted in training him, a green 3-year-old. Of course, he's still my favorite horse in the barn.

Here people work joyfully at whatever needs doing, help each other, appreciate friendships, and give their all to the major task - assisting our riders to grow and progress and become the best they can be. Their smiles are priceless. The passion and dedication of our instructors and program director filter down to inspire everyone else, from the Board of Directors all the way to people like me setting tack on Tuesday mornings. The privilege of being here to offer my small contribution blends with that of every other volunteer, constructing the foundation that enables the whole thing to function so effectively. All the volunteers and staff whose joy and kindness, experience and knowledge, and endless patience make TRI the BEST job I ever had.

Volunteer Shannon C. writes…

I came across TRI while getting my haircut back in 2016. I was sharing with my hair dresser what my dream career is—being a Therapeutic Riding Instructor—and she mentioned TRI to me and got me the contact information. I then attended volunteer orientation, and the rest is history :) I have been a volunteer ever since! My favorite horse at TRI is definitely Serena, I was given the opportunity to take my high school senior pictures with her (pictured above).  

Being a horse rider, I love volunteering here because it's another place I get to be surrounded by horses—but it isn't just the horses that makes volunteering here special. The riders, families, and other volunteers make this place feel like a second home. Aside from my barn I ride at, I attribute a lot of my equine success to my TRI family, Jan and Linda have helped me immensely! Thanks to TRI, I have been able to improve my skills, both handling the horse on the ground and when riding. So far, my greatest equine accomplishment is breaking out and training 2 Thoroughbred yearlings this year at school (one pictured above). Before doing this at school, Jan gave me advice and made sure I knew the right way to handle the process, because everyone handles breaking out differently. Thanks to her and the University of Findlay, I was able to develop a method that worked not only for myself, but worked correctly for the horse. TRI has been such a big part of my story and I cannot wait to get back there and see everyone I have missed during the school year :)