By Lisa Peterson

and Adria Henderson

My favorite childhood memory is galloping my horse across the Newtown countryside, behind a pack of baying foxhounds, as a member of the Fairfield County Hounds.

It all began in 1974 on my first foxhunt aboard my pony “Gingersnap.” It was an exhilarating ride across open meadows, jumping stone-walls, chicken coops and timber fences. For years, Newtown was filled with wide open spaces, endless trails, well-maintained jumps and very friendly “landowners” who would bask in the glory and pride of having the hunt ride over their property twice a week. Local riders would vie for an appointment to the hunt staff and the privilege of wearing the scarlet hunt coat.

Among my favorite activities were the hunt breakfasts. Stellar social events hosted at the homes of prominent landowners such as the Fultons, or sponsored at local restaurants like The Newtown Inn. These gatherings of “Newtown horse people” were etched in my childhood experience forever. I can still see the master passing “stirrup cups” to chilled members on a frosty November morning at the kennels on Huntingtown Road. The huntsman blowing his horn was a signal to the hounds and to me that another brisk ride across Mother Nature’s landscape was about to begin.

As a teenager, these sights and sounds challenged my senses. Every paper I wrote as a Trumbull High School student spoke of “heavy horses,” the “wilds of Newtown” and the “thrill of the hunt.” Newtown hadn’t yet become Trumbull - a sleepy sterile suburban community. All suburbs were once rural, so were all cities for that matter.

My horse “Speculation” and I rode our last foxhunt on Thanksgiving Day 1979. We were joined by more than 100 horses galloping across the harvested cornfields at Hundred Acres Farm toward the stonewall fences. Although the hunt moved out of Newtown in the mid-1980s, the then newly formed Newtown Bridle Lanes Association tried to capture the “essence of the hunt” with its annual hunter pace. I gleefully attended last year’s pace with my old foxhunting horse to recapture that childhood thrill of riding the Newtown landscape. We even jumped some of the same stonewalls we took flight over some 20 years earlier.

Today I am a Newtown homeowner and horse owner. When I made the decision to buy a home six years ago, I immediately selected Newtown for its horse friendly atmosphere. When I moved my horse to my backyard five years ago, to ride the remains of the foxhunting trails, I realized childhood memories are easily shattered

In the beginning I rode over to Huntingtown State Park through trails and easements behind the then Norfield Farm on Poverty Hollow Road. Each spring I would ride out and find more and more trails cut off by new homes in the Greenleaf Farms development. I persevered and found new legal routes into the park until last summer. Now homeowners are disputing legal easements belonging to the NBLA and are sabotaging our trails with barriers such as stonewalls and barbed wire. They have even called the police. What happened to the friendly landowners of my youth? Eventually, my access to the park was cut off.

I lost my old foxhunting buddy “Speculation” in January and was given a beautiful new horse “Thunder Bay” in June. I made the decision not to keep him on my property because my access to trails had been eliminated until further notice in the courts. I board at a barn now with access to trails via Newtown Forest Association land. We ride the NBLA trails and are thoroughly enjoying ourselves.

Recently, however, I have seen unauthorized mini-bikes tearing up the trails and making a mess. I am concerned that the horses will be blamed and banned from the trails, once again cutting off my access. I feel threatened my childhood memories may be taken away due to circumstances beyond my control.

Over the years I’ve met many Newtown horse people and I hear their stories of vanishing lands and “horse-friendly” landowners. Just last weekend at a hunter pace I heard a woman lament about the arrival of the “city folks” in the big new houses who are “ruining it for us and our horses and we were here first.”

Currently, there are many horse farms and properties on the market. These represent hundreds of acres of land at risk to the looming developer’s bulldozer. While hopefully some properties will continue to be home to horses, others may not. Commercial stables, both legal and illegal, have had major battles with the town and neighbors in order to just conduct their businesses. Some are taking flight and others are not moving in to replace them.

My biggest fear is that Newtown will lose its greatest asset  - its horse friendly lifestyle. It is an agreeable way of life sought by many and enjoyed by those beyond horse ownership. You don’t have to ride or even own horses to enjoy the roadside beauty of horses grazing in their paddocks or the open spaces needed to preserve horse landscapes.

 As a small community of horse lovers we should be vigilant in our efforts to preserve our way of life. Even our local newspaper has a page dedicated to Horse News. The NBLA, in conjunction with the Newtown Bridle Lands Trust, is making a good effort to work with developers to preserve existing trails and create new open spaces.

Cherishing one’s childhood memories is a universal pleasure. I hope I can keep mine alive in Newtown.