By Tom Sumners

Special to the Tribune

The Diamond Jubilee 75th Anniversary of the Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration will begin next Wednesday, Aug. 21, in Shelbyville, on the historic grounds of The Celebration. It will run for 11 days and 10 nights, ending, as always, on the Saturday before Labor Day. The excitement of the World's Greatest Horse Show comes with the concerns of many people who have faced a lot of scrutiny and negativity the past year.

The number of entries in the show this year has declined 20 percent from 2012. The Celebration announced that 2,137 entries have been made this year, down from 2,671 from last year, or 534 total. A lot of horses are entered into more than one class. The total number of horses that make up those entries declined by 22 percent, 1,469 in 2012 and 1,144 for this year. A lot of factors led to this decline, among them economic conditions and turmoil and unrest in the industry. They have played havoc with several shows during the 2013 show season. In the last two weeks, the court case in Ft. Worth, Texas, with SHOW, the Horse Industry Organization supported by The Celebration against the United States Department of Agriculture over mandatory penalties for violation of the Horse Protection Act. The federal judge ruled in favor of the USDA. This case was started over a year ago and it is interesting that the verdict came out three weeks before The Celebration. The Belfast Horse Show scheduled for Aug. 3 was postponed because the date was not set for the penalties to go into effect. With challenges that the plaintiff could not foresee, a lot of owners and trainers chose not to enter their horses. If a decision by SHOW is made before next Wednesday, The Celebration said any entry can withdraw if they disagree with their decision.

One of the changes for the show this year is The Celebration will require the top four winners in each preliminary class to show back in their respective championship class in order to receive their prize money. There are some exceptions to this rule. For the first time, The Celebration will have Owner-Amateur Five-Year-Old Mares and Geldings and Stallions qualifying classes and will crown the first Owner-Amateur Five-Year-Old World Grand Champion. The TWHNC during this show season gave commerative medallions to the winners of this class. Other changes include the Trail Pleasure division.

Due to the negativity and misinformation campaign that has dogged the walking horse industry for several years, both the one-night shows and the multi-night shows have suffered. The charities that these show support have suffered tremendously. It has had a great impact on The Celebration financially. In the last six years, over $900,000 has been lost in revenue. In addition, SHOW, the HIO owned by The Celebration, has lost over $500,000 since 2009. Costs have gone up and the revenues have gone down. Profits from the concessions at The Celebration go to the civic clubs of Bedford County. It amounts to almost $400,000.

The judges for the 75th Celebration include Rollie Beard of Lewisburg. His first Celebration was in 1988, the 50th anniversary when Doc's High Tribute and Steve Aymett of Lewisburg were crowned World Grand Champion. Beard also judged in 1994, 2002, 2005, 2008 and 2009. Also judging is Jamie Bradshaw of Union Grove, Ala. This is his fourth time to judge; the previous times were in 2006, 2009 and 2011. Other judges are Allen Forman of Thomson, Ga. who also judged in 2007; Leigh Stuart of Alvaton, Ky. who judged the Pleasure Division in 1997; and Derek Bonner of Mooresboro, N.C., appearing at The Celebration for the first time.

On a personal note, let's make this, the 75th Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration the very best that we can. We can have a positive attitude and prove to all the folks who have been negative to the industry that we can have a good, clean, honorable horse show. By the way, we have the best horse, the Tennessee Walking Horse.