The Horse Lover: A Cowboy’s Quest to Save the Wild Mustangs

He already owned and managed two ranches and needed a third about as much as he needed a permanent migraine: that’s what Alan Day said every time his friend pestered him about an old ranch in South Dakota. But in short order, he proudly owned 35,000 pristine grassy acres. The opportunity then dropped into his lap to establish a sanctuary for unadoptable wild horses previously warehoused by the Bureau of Land Management. After Day successfully lobbied Congress, those acres became Mustang Meadows Ranch, the first government-sponsored wild horse sanctuary established in the United States.

The Horse Lover is Day’s personal history of the sanctuary’s vast enterprise, with its surprises and pleasures and its plentiful dangers, frustrations, and heartbreak. Day’s deep connection with the animals in his care is clear from the outset, as is his maverick philosophy of horse-whispering, with which he trained fifteen hundred wild horses. The Horse Lover weaves together Day’s recollections of his cowboying adventures astride some of his best horses, all of which taught him indispensable lessons about loyalty, perseverance, and hope. This heartfelt memoir reveals the Herculean task of balancing the requirements of the government with the needs of wild horses.

Alan Day was the owner of Mustang Meadows Ranch near St. Francis, South Dakota; Rex Ranch near Whitman, Nebraska; and Lazy B Ranch in southern Arizona. With his sister, Sandra Day O’Connor, he coauthored Lazy B: Growing Up on a Cattle Ranch in the American Southwest. Lynn Wiese Sneyd is a published author and owner of LWS Literary Services. Sandra Day O’Connor served on the U. S. Supreme Court from 1981 to 2005.