Newbern Fellowship Saddle Club History

 The Newbern Saddle Club, which enjoys the title of being the oldest saddle club in West Tennessee,  began in 1955. Actually riding began about 2 years before on land provided by Elmer Moore on Wheatley Drive. . It then moved to a 5 acre tract on Williams Street across from the present Oakview Recreation Center on land  also provided by Elmer Moore. It was at this time it was organized into an official club known as the Fellowship Saddle Club.   Ham Moore was the first president, holding that office for several years.

The  arena on Williams Street was very convenient to all types of riders. It had flood lights, a sprinkler system, a pony track, a play ground for children, concession stand and concrete bleachers. Something there that would seem unusual to today’s rider was a raised loading ramp for truck to back up against to unload their horses. Few people had horse trailers back in those days and had to haul their horses in the back of their truck.

About 1965 the arena moved across the road to a vacant field which was the beginning of the Oakview Recreation Park . From then until the end of the 1998 riding season the club enjoyed many happy  years at that location.  At that time the city of Newbern decided, due to over crowding, they would move the arena to the corner of Biffle Road and Highway 77. The club began riding there at the beginning of the 1999 riding season.

During these 53 years the Newbern Fellowship Saddle Club has been in existence it has engaged in  a great variety of  family oriented activities. There have been many hundreds of members, many of which are now deceased. There has been riding at the arena every Saturday night May through September with lots of visiting and playing of games. Every year there have been horse shows. Over the years there were several different types of shows. For many years one of the most popular was the Tennessee Walking Horse Show. We have been members of the West Tennessee Saddle Club Association and are currently having National Barrel Horse Shows. The club  members have also enjoyed trail riding together at many various locations over the years. There have been Sunday afternoon rides, moonlight rides and caravans of trucks and trailers traveling together to various organized trail rides  in several states.

Without a doubt, the one thing that has made this saddle club successful is the monthly supper meeting it has. There are pot luck suppers, ice cream suppers, watermelon suppers, wiener roast, chili suppers!  As far as anyone can remember this has been a tradition of the club since its beginning. The official purpose of this meeting is to discuss the business of the Saddle Club but many times the club had no real business to discuss. It was just a good excuse to get together  eat and visit.  On one occasion when Mrs. Agnes Harris read the minutes from the previous meeting it was only one sentence. “If we hadn’t a et, we wouldn’t a met.”            

The club has always been blessed with members willing to work to make the club succeed. A few of the former presidents have been Ham Moore, Paul Harris, Wallace Oliver, Calvin Robertson,  Shawnee Cobb, Oliver Gibbons, Millard Gatlin,  Glen Oliver, Mike Thompson, Rudy White, Larry Anderson, Tommy Wright, Tommy Davidson, Carol Shaw, Pat Hinds, Terry Harris, Lisa Hollis, Cindy Wells, Jerry Edmundson and Ryan Webb. Our current president is John Dykes.

Newbern Fellowship Saddle Club

The Saddle Club as we call it is the oldest continually operated Saddle Club in West Tennessee.