The Feather Fund
by Fran Severn
Little girls and horses. Is there a more charming picture than a smiling girl with her arms around the neck of her horse at the start of a lifelong friendship?
That’s the heart of the romance of the Chincoteague ponies: the story of a little girl saving her birthday money and lemonade sales to but a pony at the auction.
The trouble is that the ponies don’t come cheap. Even in a bad economy, the foals go for around a thousand dollars; in good years, lots more.
Enter The Feather Fund. Back in 1995, Lois & Dan Szymanski traveled to Chincoteague with their daughters Shannon and Ashley. The girls had saved $500. They bid on every pony, and every pony went to someone else. Then a lady wearing a large, floppy hat approached. Her name was Carollynn Suplee and she wanted to help the girls buy a horse. The Szymanski’s politely refused until Carollynn explained her story. She was fighting cancer, a brain tumor. After her surgery, she began finding feathers. Everywhere. Places feathers aren’t supposed to be. She then read Psalm 91, which is about being covered with feathers as a sign of being in God’s care. She decided that she needed to give back some of the gifts she’d received in life. When she’d heard about the girls, a seagull feather floated down in front of her. And Shannon’s t-shirt had feathers in the design. She took the celestial hint.
The pony they won was solid brown. Except for the marking on his neck that looked like a jagged white feather. They named him Sea Feather.
Every year after that, Carollynn and her husband, Ed, helped a child get their dream pony. They continued until Carollynn died in 2003.
Her friends decided to continue her work and founded The Feather Fund. They review entries from children living around the country, making sure they know what’s involved in taking care of and training a foal and that they have the facilities to do so. Equally important is the essay the child writes about why they want a Chincoteague pony.
The winners travel to Chincoteague for Pony Penning Week. They pick out their heart’s desire and wait for the foal to show up in the bidding circle. Most of the crowd figures out pretty quickly when the foal is a Feather Fund hopeful. It probably has something to do with the anxious looks from the young girl or boy clinging to the fence as the bids climb. The applause when the gavel falls and the child realizes that the foal is really theirs is especially loud. You might not see them, but you know there are feathers in the air.
For more information about The Feather Fund, visit their website: www.featherfund.org.
(Photos from The Feather Fund website)
