CHAPTER II. 



MY FIRST RACE WITH LITTLE DAVE — REV. MR. 

 FANNING— GEORGE FULLER — MY FIRST TRIP 

 THROUGH THE GRAND CIRCUIT. 



THE success which attended my efforts in break- 

 ing and training these few horses was known to 

 Reverend Talbert Fanning, of whom I have 

 spoken, and in the summer of 1871 or 1872 he wrote 

 me to come and see him. I did so, and made an 

 arrangement with him to go to his place and handle 

 his recently imported Morgan horses for one year. 

 One of these horses was a small chestnut stallion, 

 about 14^ hands high, called '' Little Dave." He 

 was a pure-gaited trotter, and we thought he could 

 trot quite fast for so small a horse, Mr. Fanning 

 also had a pair of gray geldings that were of fair 

 size, quite stylish, and matched well. They, also, 

 had quite a fair amount of speed. That fall there 

 were several county fairs in Wilson and adjoining 

 counties, and I expressed to Mr. Fanning a desire to 

 take Little Dave and the gray team to the fairs and 

 enter them in the show classes. He readily gave his 

 consent and I took them to Lebanon. I entered the 

 pair as a double team, also entered one of the geldings 

 as a single driver, and also entered Little Dave in the 

 stallion class, and took a premium with each entry. 

 On the last day of the fair there was a trotting race in 

 which I started Little Dave hitched to a skeleton 

 wagon and won the race, best time 3.04, and I 



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