Pony Express passes through Granger

The 36th annual re-ride of the Pony Express National Historic Trail passed through Granger Saturday.

The National Pony Express Association (NPEA) started their annual re-ride June 15 in St. Joseph, Mo. and will end in Sacramento, Calif. June 25. This year is the 155th anniversary of the historic mail service. Each June, a re-ride is done over a 10-day period. They carry real letters in a mochila, which is a removable leather pack that fits on the horse's saddle that was used in the original Pony Express. The trail is 1,966 miles and goes through Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and California.

Pete Gailey rode into Granger on his horse, Little Ann, around 3:30 p.m.

"This is Little Ann, from 'Where the Red Fern Grows,'" Gailey said, "Old Dan is waiting at home." They quickly transferred the mochila to the next horse, Legend, and rider, Gerald Pollock. They took off and the whole transfer took a little over a minute.

The re-ride was scheduled to arrive in Granger at 12:30 p.m. but the powerful wind and warm temperatures near Casper slowed them down quite a bit. Also, two riders were bucked off Friday night, one near Casper and the other around Atlantic City. One rider was taken to the Wyoming Medical Center in Casper and the other was taken to Riverton Hospital. Both of the riders were better Saturday morning.

Each state has their own division president, and Wyoming's is Les Bennington from Glenrock. "I have responsibility from state line to state line," Bennington said. He was expecting to arrive in Utah by 10 p.m. Saturday.

The re-ride is the longest event held annually on a national historic trail and all of the riders are volunteers. Since the riders are volunteers, it can become difficult to ensure riders are in position when they get two to three hours behind schedule because they have other responsibilities.

They try to change horses after about five miles, because that's about the distance the horses start to tire. On the original Pony Express, riders changed horses about every 10 miles. The horses aren't always ready for the run, especially in years where there has been a lot of rainfall. The rain causes the horses to get fat because they don't have to graze all day to get food, due to the massive amounts of vegetation. Luckily, the rain didn't cause any flooding problems, as there were only a few minor washouts along the trail.

It takes about 55 hours to get across Wyoming so food and water for the horses aren't usually an issue. The horses don't tend to drink a lot of water while running the trail because their stomachs will get full. "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink," Bennington said.