Many Americans might associate Clydesdales with a certain brewery in St. Louis, but in St. Mary’s County, Maryland, folks immediately think of a guy named Wayne Mast. The local farmer keeps a team of the showy draft horses, and each year on the second weekend in December, the horses meet their fans during Suttler Post Farm’s annual open house (this year on December 13 and 14).
Mast bought his first Clydesdale in 2001 when his thirteen-year-old daughter talked him into it. “Daddy and daughter, you know how that goes,” Mast says. “My wife said: What the hell were you thinking?”
But a few months later, he hitched up a carriage to take his son and a date to the high school prom, and he saw the animal’s allure firsthand. “All these people had limos, but we were the big star of the show when we came with the horse.”
Now Mast has eight. Each of the “Clydes,” as he calls them, has a distinct personality, but all are eager to work. “When you put that harness on them and put that bit in their mouth, they show off,” he says. “They know they’re good, and that’s what they do.”
The breed, developed in eighteenth-century Scotland as muscular draft animals, were named for the River Clyde. Strength aside, the horses are crowd pleasers, easily recognized by their long manes and tails and the flowing hair on their legs called feathers. Although the animals weigh up to a ton, they love the attention from visitors, says farm volunteer Cathy Williams. “They’re like giant puppies,” she says. “People can’t believe how sweet they are.”
For the past eight years, Mast has had the honor of hitching up the Clydes to deliver a Christmas tree to the First Lady. After their drive to the capital, the ceremonial trek the horses take from the back of the White House to the front door isn’t very far, Mast admits. “It’s what, fifty yards?” But it’s still a thrill, and he was excited to be scheduled to do it again this year. He keeps the grand horses busy year-round, offering carriage rides and appearing at weddings, fairs, and other community events.
Find more information about Suttler Post Farm and the annual open house here.
Larry Bleiberg is a Virginia native and past president of the Society of American Travel Writers. He served on a Pulitzer Prize–winning team and has won ten Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Awards. He has contributed to the BBC, National Geographic, The Washington Post, CNN, Fodors, Afar, AARP, and Atlas Obscura, among others. A former travel editor of the Dallas Morning News and Coastal Living, he’s also the founder of CivilRightsTravel.com, a guide to visiting historic sites from the civil rights movement.
