***WINTER 2010

Are we proud of Emma Batchelder!! Soon after the Haitian earthquake, she and a surgical team from Dartmouth Medical Center were on a Partners In Health jet loaded with supplies. After arriving in the Dominican Republic, they and their gear went overland to Port-au- Prince, where they spent nearly two weeks serving the disaster victims. Emma is a post-op and critical care nurse. She and her fellow nurses had to improvise due to lack of the equipment they are used to, as well as making decisions and performing procedures that they might not do in a stateside setting. She will remain forever touched by the faith, resilience and gratitude of the Haitian people in the face of such excruciating horror. Thank you Emma for representing us and thank you for those who kept watch on the New Hampshire farm, allowing Emma to go: Lisa, Teresa and Jason.

***Fall 2009***
Sorry to you who missed the fall German trip. Kathy Feehery and Amy Bresky got super new partners as a result of Verne’s efforts. Rosalie, Kathy’s new mare was shown extensively in Germany and will, hopefully, help Kathy break the 3rd/4th level barrier. She is drop dead gorgeous and an in-hand winner, so look for her at the Northeast breed shows. Amy has another winner in Farlight. He is tall, dark and handsome. He did his first Prix St Georges in Germany, a week after Verne found him, winning the class with a 65%. And he is only seven and looking like a CDI contender. Amy showed him shortly after his arrival in Southern Pines with great success and scores to 68%. Many congratulations to these lucky ladies. We anticipate the continued progress of these teams. For the rest of you, Jeanie and Verne are planning a May trip to Germany, we have some very exciting weanlings to two year olds at River House as well as a number of trained horses in Florida for the season. Check it out!
It seems like we just got home to New Hampshire and it is time to head south for the upcoming season! We had a very busy summer with Verne doing lots of clinics in New Hampshire, Massachusetts and New York. We had three super foals, two by Tony and one by Maronjo, although Trina kept her mare and Maronjo colt here all season so we had a total of four romping about.(see more about the inspection and competition news under the months) The inspection was a work of art under Emma’s direction. She again prepared and hosted a lovely party for friends, neighbors and Hanoverian breeders. If you have never been to one of her catered events, you really owe yourself to come next time!! The girls have both applied for graduate school and are in the interview process but Nora will be on the Florida farm for the winter and Emma will be holding down the fort in New Hampshire with Lisa and Jason’s able help. The first week of November, after teaching a five day clinic in Southern Pines, Verne and Nora loaded up eight horses and three corgis in two trailers and, with Jason as third driver, headed out to Williston, Florida. Jeanie is really hoping they will be back to pick up her five horses and one corgi before the snow arrives!! The Florida farm looks to be hopping this winter. We hope you will get down for some sun, to take in the horse immersion in the Ocala area, to hang out with our gang and to see all Florida has to offer. See you then!!

April 2009

April 2009 News!!

The Jacksonville Dressage on the First Coast show the first weekend in April was really fun! The new horse park is all it should be with great stabling and rings and a fabulous indoor with seating for large audiences. Nora and Jeanie as well as Cindy Rose were entered. Verne drove back and forth two hours from the farm as we had clients to keep riding! Tony finished up his Florida tour by coming second (by a fraction of a point) to Gwen Poulin and the seasoned Much Ado in the Grand Prix. He earned a 81 % on Sunday in the Freestyle! His Florida scores for the Freestyle were 72, 74 and 81%.  Featuring Cirque de Soleil music and choreography by Karen Robinson, Tony’s freestyle is wonderful to see. He loves it, too! Cindy finished up her Florida experience by getting a 67% and her bronze medal!! Congratulations Cindy!! Jeanie was pleased with Weide’s fifth in the Grand Prix. It was a pretty clean test but a little tense in the indoor. 
Two days after the show Verne and Jeanie headed North with the first load. After a staight shot of twenty- six hours they blurred home to the New Hampshire farm! Verne rested briefly then headed back to Florida via a one day clinic at UMass and a four day clinic in Southern Pines, N.C. Once back on the Florida farm (no rest for the wicked ) he finished putting the edging boards around the new sand ring. Ouch!! is all we have to say.
Jeanie was excited to be asked to do a clinic at Jamie Fells Tap Root farm in Hinesburg Vt. Jamie has an enthusiastic group of juniors and young adults, many riding our favorites, mares! It was a lot of fun.
Verne continues to have many clients on the Florida farm. He will do another four day clinic in Southern Pines in mid- April and then head North for Nora’s Amherst graduation anda heavy clinic schedule for the summer. Emma has nearly finished her orientation at DHMC ‘s intensive care center. She is also working three twelve hour shifts a week. She was up at four o’clock the other morning to ride her wonderful Maronjo mare ( out of SPS Arielle) before heading off to work. That’s dedication! Things will, unfortunately, settle down soon as she has been making frequent trips to Colorado to see her SO. He is being deployed soon. Please keep him in your thoughts. More time to ride but less time to see her friend!
We have our first foal of the year! Arielle has a really lovely Bretone colt. He is long-legged and very chipper. One of the easiest foalings ever. It never ceases to delight, teaching the newbies to enjoy human contact. This little guy seems to like having his halter put on if only so he can buck around the paddock trying to shake it off!!

June 2007
It worked!! They are qualified and get to go to Gladstone in June. What an opportunity. Show results from Saratoga - Jeanie and Sanano debuted at Grand Prix and earned scores to 64%. Amanta and Nora won the open fourth level championship with a 67% average for 3 tests - not bad for a 7 year old mare. Bretone and Nora qualified for Gladstone with solid scores to 65% at Intermediaire II.
The Bretone foals are here. Three fillies one colt. Two bays two chestnuts. They look super. Can’t wait for the Hanoverian inspection July 25.
We still get notices from Germany about sightings of under saddle Bretone offspring. Everyone is impressed.
The youngsters are developing nicely under saddle here on the farm. Come take a look. 

November 2009 News

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We had a full summer as usual! The inspection was a big success with a great party catered by Emma. The food and company were to die for! We had a lovely group of horses and lots of local success. See the latest issue of the Hanoverian News for a write up and photo of Susie Boardman’s awesome mare, bred by Eliza Rutherford. SPS Mijou’s foal was deemed top filly on the day. Micanopy RH by Maronjo, was quite young but still showed off her movement and elasticity. Mijou’s babies often top the inspection. SPS Weltfee had the best colt for movement-he was looking a little awkward on the day,however, Baaron Miller by Bretone (and named for Captain Miller) is absolutely beautiful now with exceptional conformation and movement. We are really enjoying the Tony/Weltfee cross.
As we showed quite a bit in Florida, we did only a few shows up here. Nora got her five year old, Bahai out and took Amanta and Tony to GMHA. They also went to the region 8 championships where they both placed in their individual classes and Amanta was the I1 freestyle champion and Tony the reserve grand prix freestyle champion! Congratulations!!
Our old lady, Greta by Grande has passed on to that pasture in the sky. She was 27 and had had 17 foals, including a set of twins. Greta had two Weinsteins, a Gastronom, a Santano, the twins by Arrian and the rest from Maronjo. Her Maronjo babies were extra special, including breed show champions, high point dressage horses as well as best loved friends. Her Santano, we recently heard, is doing PSG on the West Coast. Her last baby, Maggie, a 16.3 hand grey known for her spectacular extension, has gone to Colorado. The next to last, a petite bay named Mandolin, is owned by our dear, dear friend Lisa LeBlanc and is here for the month of November,in training. Mandolin just did her first flying change!! We are so proud that Greta’s offspring live on. She was our first Hanoverian bought at a dispersal in Canada with Jeanie pulling Verne’s hand out of the air and crying"we can’t afford it!” She came with a foal at foot and bred back.  Greta, when she stopped producing, was one of the last five Grande mares known to still be breeding. (he had 1500 offspring and an enormous impact on the breed-Greta looked just like him- a chestnut, 15.3 hand little power house) Thank you Greta for establishing us as Hanoverian breeders.
Verne and Nora have been on the Florida farm since early November getting things ready for the winter season. Nora has some new jumpers and plans to head to HITS as well as playing Dressage. Emma is with Jeanie in New Hampshire. She is working full time as an intensive care nurse at Dartmouth and moonlighting in the ER at Cottage(when she isn’t baking Christmas cookies and talking to Captain Miller). She is interviewing at nurse anesthetist programs and will know her next step soon.

December 2008 a very different Christmas!!

Anyone who knows us well remembers that Christmas in the Hahn house is a gala affair. The house is decorated with ornaments old and new, delicious aromas fill the air, family arrives to open tribute, squabble, play games and feast. This year the Batchelder side of the clan packed our bags ( and I do mean our BAGS !!), loaded the corgis and horses and drove 26 hours to Florida. Verne had taken a load down in late October and stayed to add five new stalls and beautiful new fencing to the Florida compound. After working like a dog- what a strange expression-have you seen a dog work? maybe working it?- he got to drive back up to New Hampshire to pick up Jeanie and their load of five horses and Dhama. Nora and her friend Anne took Anne’s jumper Ollie, Bahai and stopped in North Carolina to pick up Emma’s horse, Mandy (see photo link of Mandy and Emma). Of course, Nora had her constant companion, the corgi ambassadress, Suma Bear) We arrived to 85 degree weather and a very different landscape. The horses and dogs took to their new digs with out a hitch. Christmas was a very different experience! We decorated a fake ficcus tree, rode our horses in t-shirts and relaxed in our shorts! Verne went to the local antique/junque store and got his women unique and inventive gifts! We spent time as a family before the riders started to arrive. Go to the January/February news to learn all about the ongoing saga which will include scores to nearly 74% and elephants!!

2007-"Time flies" and so did we!! Jeanie and I were both able to go to Germany in November. It was great. We saw old friends and scoured the countryside for horses. Very successful - four horses purchased, 5 to 12 year olds, 2 mares 2 geldings, second level to PSG, $35,000 to $55,000 direct sales to their new delighted owners. Contacts are everything in this process.  Verne just had the opportunity to return to Maine to clinic at Peggy Flanagan’s Rock Wood farm. A super group with some faces from former times in Maine. Emma is back in the Duke area and Nora is closing in on the end of her semester at Amherst. The horses are going great. The youngstock are developing and selling. Christmas is coming and Verne leaves for Florida the day after. We all look forward to the New Year from both "ends" of the country. Take care!!

March 2009 News!

May 2008*** Jeanie is very excited as Verne will be home from Florida around the fifteenth of the month. Not that he will have time to relax!! He is planning to stop in North Carolina on his way North to give a two day clinic for Amy Bresky and crew. Nothing like teaching for two ten-hour days in the middle of your journey! Later in the month, he will be giving clinics at UMass and Newberry, Ma, at Kathy Feehery’s. Jeanie and Verne plan to attend the NEDA seminar with Robert Dover. It should be very educational and provide a great escape to get reacquainted after a long winter apart. Jeanie and Nora will be taking four horses to Dressage at Saratoga. Nora will be doing freestyles with Amanta and Tony on Sunday so should be a lot of fun. Jeanie hopes to survive riding two Weltmeyers on the track!! She plans to take Wiede out at I-2 and her new guy, Wilde Card, better known as Wilber, may be exciting (in more ways then one) at second level.  We hope you will mark your calenders for June 14th and 15th. We are hosting a clinic for CVDA. Verne will be demonstrating various inhand techniques, using some of the River House youngsters and super stars to demonstrate intro to advanced levels of lunging and inhand work. The clinic will continue with CVDA members practicing hands on with their own horses, in lessons with Verne. Should be very educational and really fun, especially if someone brings a brombie to drag Verne around!! Just kidding.  Nora will be home for three weeks,until after Saratoga. She and Jeanie will be continuing to start the coming three year olds. Jeanie has been lunging them all winter and has thrown Lisa Leblanc up to ride them around on the lunge. Now Nora will finish this part of their early education. We really have a great selection of three, four and five year olds. Good thing as the dollar is so weak in Europe that imports are way out of many peoples’ league!  Nora will be working in the lab again this summer. She has finished her thesis and her chemistry major and will graduate summa. Congratulations!!She has one more semester and will take a number of art courses to complete her second major.  Emma is having a short school holiday. She has been visiting friends in New York and Boston. She and her faithful Corgi, Nettie will head back to Durham to spend the summer back at Duke. She will graduate from the accelerated nursing program in December. She seems to be well- liked by her professors who have been very complimentary and encouraging. She will need to work on the floor for a year or two before continuing with her advanced degree. Emma has her four year old mare a Maronjo from the fabulous Argentan mare Arielle, in Durham. They are hoping to get to a few shows this season. 

2007***The business there is really developing nicely. We are in the midst of foaling, breeding and show season now so here we go!! Nora is trying out for The Brentina Cup again so she has had to finish up her year at Amherst and go straight to the shows. She and Bretone just earned a 67% at Intermediaire 2 at Saratoga so they should be "in", we will see. Amanta, Nora’s 8 year old Alabaster mare, won the I - 1 at Mystic last weekend and the PSG and I - 1 at Saratoga this weekend. Jeanie took Deecie Denison’s new horse "Sebastian" to Saratoga and won the 2nd level Championship with a three test average of 67% and also won a third level class. Deecie just got this horse last December from our November trip to Germany. Verne went to Germany in late April and purchased 5 horses. Three are direct sales to clients and 2 are for our inhouse development program. Clinics are up and running. River Run Farm in Newburyport MA and Chestnut Hill Farm in Germantown NY are the regulars this season. The 20th annual Hanoverian Inspection is here on July 10th. Nora earned her Phi Beta Kappa membership at Amherst College and was announced as the top student in her class. She is working at Amherst this summer on a fellowship grant from Pfizer (along with her horse work of course). Emma starts an Advanced Nursing Program at Duke in NC this August. Sadly she just lost her dog and best friend "Taz" recently. 

Moleibi

 16.2+ dark bay gelding by Maronjo out of a Rubenstein mare, Moleibi is the quintessential dressage horse with color, movement, go and a beautiful tail!