GERMANTOWN – Leading up to the 75 th Anniversary Germantown Charity Horse Show (GCHS) June 4-8 is the GCHS Painted Horseshoe Hunt, which has become a tradition enjoyed by all ages. This highly anticipated event kicks-off Wednesday, May 1.
The hunt was the idea of Barbara Bouton, a long-time member of GCHS. Bouton, who holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, has used her artistic talent and creative ideas to support the “Charity” in multiple ways over the years. In celebration of the 70 th Germantown Charity Horse Show, she wanted to generate interest and excitement about the show throughout the entire community and came up with the idea of the GCHS Painted Horseshoe Hunt using real horseshoes. The first hunt was very successful with friends and families hunting together and having lots of fun. Barbara wanted to be sure there was an educational element to the hunt too. Through social media posts of cleverly crafted clues, which include information about the community, highlights of new places in the area, and nuggets of GCHS history, she has succeeded in making this event fun and illuminating. Producing the hunt requires a lot of time, and Barbara works closely with her co-chairs, Pam and Steve Solaas, on activities like scouting locations for the best hiding spots and developing clues.
When asked about this year’s hunt, Barbara shared, “We have 75 beautiful horseshoes decorated by GCHS and community volunteers including some of our young horseshoe hunters from last year! We invite everyone in the community to participate in the fun of the hunt, to post photos of themselves with their found horseshoes to inspire other hunters, and most importantly, to join us for the 75th GCHS June 4-8.”
GCHS is one of the largest all-breed shows in the country and this year’s collection of horseshoes represents the different sizes and breeds of horses that will compete in the GCHS from Welsh Ponies to Gypsy Vanners, Paso Finos to Friesians, and more. The new horseshoes were generously donated by GCHS member Susie Logan and her husband John Logan of La Grange Forge, a local expert farrier.
A new award was introduced last year – “Good Sportsmanship Hunter.” It was inspired by Jack Eaton, a then first grader at Farmington Elementary School in Germantown who truly enjoyed the adventure of the hunt. After discovering a couple of shoes, Jack decided to leave the remaining shoes he found in place so that others could enjoy finding them too. The winner of this year’s Good Sportsmanship Hunter award will receive two tickets to the GCHS and a GCHS T-shirt. If you want to compete, you should not claim more than two shoes. Feel free to take photos of the additional shoes you find, but do not post them until after someone else finds them and makes their claim online.
Enjoy being part of the community-wide GCHS Horseshoe Hunt. Three uniquely decorated shoes will be hidden each day between May 1 and May 25, and the hunt will conclude when all 75 horseshoes have been found. Look for clues about where to search for horseshoes on The Germantown Horse Show Group Facebook page and/or on Instagram (germantowncharity), and be sure to post an image of yourself and your found horseshoe! Enjoy additional tidbits of information that will be posted on X (formerly Twitter). In addition to enjoying the thrill of the hunt, anyone finding a horseshoe will receive two free tickets to the GCHS. The lucky hunter who finds the Grand Prize Horseshoe decorated by Laura Lawson in honor of GCHS’s 75th anniversary will receive a T-shirt from the GCHS Charity General Store along with a special prize.
Mark your calendars for June 4-8 to join the 75 th historic Germantown Charity Horse Show at 7745 Poplar Pike. For more information, go to GCHS.org.
