Page 87 - July 2015

“Horse people gravitate to one another,” says Charlotte Parsons,
who’s married to Jay Parsons Jr. And she’s right. People with similar passions
— especially a passion for horses — just plain enjoy each other’s company. They love talking about horses, working with horses and being around horses.
So, it’s no surprise that both Jay and his sister, Cindy — children of the late breeders and owners Jay and Polly Parsons of Grass Valley, California — each married into horse-industry families: Char is the daughter of ProRodeo Hall of Famer Bill Linderman, and Cindy’s husband, Brian Hatley, hails from a ranching family as well. “He was more into the cattle and we were more into the horses,” says Cindy, “but we were both into both aspects of ranching.”
Although Jay and C i
legal owners of all the horses Jay Sr. and Polly bred and owned, Jay and Cindy and their spouses now comprise the Parsons Family Limited Partnership.
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Jay Sr. grew up in Kansas in the 1920s and later worked on a Montana dude ranch. Polly rode English — hunting, jumping and steeplechasing — as a child in Kentucky. On a serendipitous trip to that dude ranch out west, Polly met Jay, and they were married in 1943.
After serving in World War II, Jay moved Polly and their first daughter, Carol, to Arizona, where they added Jay Jr. and Cindy to their family in 1945 and 1948.
“We moved to Wyoming when I was about 5 years old,” Cindy says. The family continued competing in horse shows, rodeos and roping. “We were always involved with horses,” she adds. So when she went to college, her group of friends comprised other campus horse enthusiasts.
Brian, born in Douglas, Arizona, inherited his ranch background: His grandparents had a ranch there, which
his dad ended up buying from them. Brian attended New Mexico State University, then enlisted in the U. S. Navy and shipped out to Viet Nam. While he was there, Cindy enrolled
at NMSU as well. “I made friends with some of his friends and they kept telling me, ‘You’ve got to meet Brian,’” she says. “But when he got back, we never did get introduced.
“My dad was president of the Wyoming Quarter Horse Association at the time,” Cindy continues, “and our whole family went down to Mexico City for the AQHA conven- tion. I’d just gotten back to college the night before and Char and Jay were spending the night in Las Cruces. Brian called out of the blue and asked me out. I told him I couldn’t go out with him, but if he wanted to join us, he could. He did, and the rest is history!”
Jay and Char also met in college at Montana State University. “At the time I didn’t have much to do with horses,” Char says, “but our families had a lot in common and our parents knew each other. When we met, I became very involved!” Her new mother-in-law taught her English riding, and, she says, a lot of how Jay relates to horses comes from his mother’s teachings.
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who died in 2010, have long been included as
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Forming the Foundation
Keeping Their Connection
In 1971, Jay Sr. and Polly moved to California to be closer to the racing industry, and Jay and Char soon fol- lowed. “Jay’s whole life has been the horses,” Char says. “He absolutely lives and breathes these horses.”
Cindy and Brian, who met and married that same
year, moved from Brian’s family ranch in New Mexico to Colorado, where Brian earned a commercial and helicopter pilot’s license. But, ranch life and family beckoned when Brian’s parents bought property adjoining their own and
asked him and his brother to come back and help work it. Brian and Cindy stayed in New Mexico until 1979, when
they moved to El Paso. After Jay Sr. died in 2004 and Polly lost interest in going to the track, Cindy and Jay Jr. got more involved in the horse operation.
In 2011, family beckoned again and Cindy and Brian moved to Morgan Mill, Texas, to be closer to their daughters and grandkids, and from where they could still participate in the racing partnership.
Jay Sr. and Polly’s life work laid the groundwork for a family partnership that would keep Jay and Cindy and their families connected after they were gone.