LIFE - Wild Horse and Burro Act part 1

THE WILD HORSE AND BURRO ACT

The wild horse and burro movement as we know it today had its beginning in a small county courthouse in Storey County, Nevada, in 1952. Edward "Tex" Gladding presented a petition signed by 147 citizens protesting an application for a permit to use airplanes to chase down wild horses destined for the slaughteryard. Velma B. Johnston presented photographs from an earlier such roundup that showed wild horses bleeding and half dead, crushed into a truck. The Storey County Board of Commissioners banned the spotting and pursuit of wild horses by planes in their county.

Although advocates for wild horses and burros were not new, Velma Johnston became the focal point for wild horse supporters throughout the United States. Ironically, she would become famous by a name she was given in 1955, when a heckler in the Nevada State Senate Chamber unflatteringly referred to her as "Wild Horse Annie." The name caught on as Wild Horse Annie brought together people from all walks of life to help fight for wild horses and burros.

The fight did not end in Nevada with the 1959 law that prohibited the chasing and capture of wild horses on public lands with vehicles and aircraft. Wild Horse Annie led the struggle to prevent the inhumane capture practices of wild horses to the United States Congress. She also wanted assurance that some wild horses and burros would always be free to roam public lands and that if such horses became too numerous they would "be mercifully thinned out, not wiped out."

On December 15, 1971, Congress passed the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act (PL 92-195) to implement laws relating to wild horses and burros on public lands.