Michele Davis Macfarlane - EQUESTRIAN SHOW WOMAN, HORSE BREEDER, COMPETITOR
SUMMARY
Michele Davis Macfarlane is one of the most important figures in the history of Show Horse competition. Saddle seat, her focus, is a style of horse riding within the category of English riding that is designed to show off the power, grace and extravagant gaits of certain horse breeds.
Michele is the winner of multiple World's Grand Championship titles for five-gaited Saddlebreds, and the first woman to do so. She won an unprecedented five (5) championships at the Kentucky State Fair - the largest horse show in the world.
In 2020 she was awarded the Pegasus Medal of Honor, the highest award for lifetime achievement in the equestrian world. The Pegasus Award is determined by votes of U.S. Equestrian Federation members.
Her skills in standard gaits of walk, trot, and canter, won her fans worldwide. After her career in competition, she turned to exhibition, and performed before the Royal Families in Japan and Britain.
FAMILY HISTORY
Michele is the daughter of Everett Conley Davis and Ellen Browning Scripps II. Through her Conley bloodline, she is the granddaughter of Mattie Conley Davis, and great-granddaughter of 2nd Lt. Quartermaster Pascal Conley, the first protege of celebrated General John J. Pershing, who was also mentor to a generation of America’s most important military figures. Through this bloodline, she is 2x-great-granddaughter of Pascal Conley Sr., and 3x-great-granddaughter of James Conley, the stable master who managed horses for U.S. Presidents Polk, Jackson and Monroe while Head Groom at the Green Bottom Inn Equestrian Resort in the early 1800s and Antebellum Era.
Her branch of the Conley literally, helped settle the Wild West.
EARLY LIFE
Her life began on her maternal family’s beautiful Scripps Miramar Ranch, near San Diego, California. The original Scripps Ranch was developed by Michele’s great-grandfather, newspaper tycoon E.W. Scripps and his sister Ellen Browning Scripps. Spanning some 2,100 acres, the family compound was envisioned as both a winter retreat and a self-sufficient compound for the Scripps family.
Eventually, it became a year-round home for many members of the family. “The story of Scripps Miramar Ranch and its legacy has been well documented. Her great-grandfather, E.W. Scripps was a Saddle Horse enthusiast as was his sister for whom Macfarlane’s mother was named,” as written in a February 2008 article in horse industry bible, The Saddle Horse Report.
Michele’s parents evolved much of the property into an equestrian center with breeding, training, and exhibition operations. Contrary to what one would assume, Michele’s childhood was opposite of urban luxury. It was a ‘working’ horse farm. Her father, the late Everett Conley Davis, was the family’s lawyer, and maintained his law office in San Diego. Michele, her mother and sister, Victoria ‘Vickie’, worked the ranch. The family founded the Bishop’s School, a local country day school. Generations of Scripps children would attend. Horse riding was not only the main source of recreation, it was a passion. “When I was little, every free moment I had I would spend with my pony,” she continued. “When I was grounded, the punishment was that I couldn’t ride her.”
Scripps Miramar Ranch, circa 1930.
(From left to right) sister Roxanne, father Everett Conley, Michele, mother Ellen Browning. 1962 Rose Parade.
TEEN YEARS
As Michele left early childhood, her mother returned to her passion, pinto horses, but with an emphasis on parades. In 1959, the family sponsored and exhibited their pinto horses in the Rose Parade. In 1962, Michele joined her father, Everett Conley Davis in his new role as Horse Marshall of the Rose Parade, one of America’s great New Year’s traditions. Dozens more parade appearances followed, as did shows.
EARLY SUCCESS AS A BREEDER
Her daughters by her side, Ellen Browning Scripps Davis began what would become an award-winning breeding program. “My mother gradually tried to purchase nicer pintos. Since she had a Saddlebred background, she naturally gravitated toward people who had pintos with Saddlebred bloodlines,” Macfarlane said. “She went back to her aunt, Nackey Scripps Meanley owner of Scripps-Meanley Stables, got the Registry books and searched for pintos. There may have been 10 or 15 Saddlebred pintos still alive. Mother purchased them and began raising purebred American Saddlebred spotted horses,” Michele said to The Saddlebred Report.
A STAR IS BORN
In 1977 the breeding program produced CH Yorktown son, Chubasco, a Saddlebred star. Chubasco’s offspring put the Scripps Miramar spotted horses on center stage. Michele soon sat atop the Saddlebred world.
The subject of countless articles in horse publications, Michele Davis Macfarlane is a legendary figure in the Saddle Seat category. For more than 60 years, she has thrilled audiences worldwide as a breeder, rider, and carriage driver.
A PARADES FOR PRESIDENTS
The family entered an increasing number of parades, and became ‘fan favorites’ among followers of equestrian troops. This increased popularity, and the distinctive beauty of the prize-winning pinto Saddlebreds, led to invitations to perform in inaugural parades for several U.S. Presidents. The exhibitions in the nation’s capital, in turn, led to invitations to show the horses and their intricate maneuvers for royal families in Europe and Asia.
Michele Davis Macfarlane has presented for two U.S. Presidents and the royal families of Britain and Japan.
THE G.O.A.T. 1978-1998
World’s CHAMPIONSHIP HORSE SHOW
Michele and her horses kept winning, and racked up an extraordinary string of championships. CH Chubasco climbed to the top of the American Saddlebred sire ratings, and stayed there. CH Chubasco’s offspring included 58 individual horses that won 171 ribbons at the World’s Championship Horse Show.
Equestrian legend Mitchell Clark introduced CH Sky Watch to Louisville crowds in 1979, winning the Two-Year-Old Five-Gaited Stake. CH Sky Watch went on to win the highest level championship in 1982, 1983 and 1984.
CH Memories’ Citation and Clark won the Three-Year-Old Three-Gaited title and a Reserve World’s Grand Championship 1992. The following year, they won the roses – after qualifying by winning the Junior Three-Gaited Stake.
On Aug. 27, 1988, Michele challenged 10 professionals in the Five-Gaited World Grand Championship. That class, which culminated in a three-horse workout between the reigning world’s grand champion CH Imperator, with Don Harris in the irons, CH Callaway’s Mr. Republican with Rick Wallen, The Phoenix with John Conatser and Macfarlane aboard CH Sky Watch. When the judges finally rendered their scores Michele Davis Macfarlane had won the first of her World’s Grand Championships.
Next was CH Memories’ Citation, and another World’s Grand Championship in 1996.
THE 1998 OLYMPICS
At the end of a 20-year run of success, Michele Davis Macfarlane would stride onto one the world’s biggest stages - The Olympics.
In 1998, the Scripps-Miramar Ranch teamed up with Michele Macfarlane’s close friend, Elisabeth Goth-Chelberg to participate in the Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan. Scripps Miramar Ranch provided authentic Abbott and Downing stagecoaches and the spotted Chubasco offspring to pull it.
Elisabeth drove a team of pinto American Saddlebreds to an authentic stagecoach, accompanied by several outriders.
The the horses showcased included: CH The Fire Fox, winner of the 1995 and ’96 Adult Country Pleasure World’s and World’s Champion of Championships and the 1989 Adult Show Pleasure World’s Championship and Reserve Champion of Championship; CH Astra Music, dam of Swatch Watch, CH Bonnie Buck and Suki Snowlet; CH Wysteria, CH Unexpected Turbulence, CH Like Lightning, CH Thunder Country, Belize, CH Nobody's Business, CH Dilettante and Artistry.
WINTER OLYMPICS
Scripps Miramar Saddlebreds
ICONIC ERA 2000-2010
Her place in equestrian history secured, Michele Davis Macfarlane became iconic on three fronts:
The bloodlines of her spotted Saddlebred breeding program continued to produce winning horses for owners nationwide;
Her annual calendar thrilled equestrian fans with photographs of horses set against national symbols of America’s beauty;
Each New Year’s Day, her beautifully restored stage coaches ring in a new year in the Tournament of Roses Parade.
HISTORICAL NOTE
In her retirement, Michele is an exhibitor of her beautifully restored carriages and stage coaches. Each year parade audiences are treated to a different cultural theme for her carriages, riding costumes, and horse tack.