Harness Up! with Haste Draft Horses and Mules

Harnessing History: The Horse Tours of Gettysburg Story

• Haste Draft Horses and Mules • Episode 18

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Ever wondered what it would be like to experience one of America's most pivotal battles the way soldiers did in 1863? Step into the hoofprints of history with Horse Tours of Gettysburg, a family-owned business bringing the Civil War battlefield to life through carriage rides and guided horseback tours.

Doug Stevens, a veteran who served six deployments between Afghanistan and Iraq, founded the company in 2010 as a way to stay connected with horses after sustaining combat injuries. What began as a family operation has blossomed into a thriving business now transitioning to his 6'11" son Spencer and Spencer's girlfriend Jamie, the self-proclaimed "Executive Director of Horseback Riding." Their passion for history, horses, and people creates an experience unlike any other in Gettysburg.

With nine carriage teams and 31 trail horses, the company offers visitors multiple ways to engage with the battlefield's history. Licensed battlefield guides accompany each tour, sharing stories that transport guests back to July 1863 when 34,000 casualties made this the bloodiest battle in North American history. As Jamie explains, "We try to set them up to be safe out there" while ensuring guests gain historical understanding along with their horseback experience.

What sets these tours apart is how they allow guests to experience the battlefield "at the speed of history." Many of the battlefield's wayside markers were designed to be viewed from a carriage, not a car. Guests ride on the same military crests where officers positioned themselves, seeing the landscape through a similar lens as those who fought there. Even more fascinating, some trees that witnessed the battle still contain bullets, occasionally discovered when chainsaws hit metal during maintenance.

In an age dominated by screens and text messages, these tours create space for genuine human connection. As Doug poignantly shares, they once hosted a mother with terminal cancer and her resentful teenage children who transformed from sullen to joyful during their ride, creating lasting memories amid difficult circumstances.

Ready to experience Gettysburg in the most authentic way possible? Book your tour today and discover why thousands of visitors return year after year to see history through the eyes—and from the backs—of horses.

Follow Horse Tours of Gettysburg on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/horsetoursgettysburg/

Check out the website - https://confederatetrails.com/

YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@HorseToursofGettysburg

Support the show

Find us online at DraftHorsesAndMulesForSale.com

Speaker 1:

Good morning folks. Stephen Haste here with Harness Up Podcast with Haste, draft Horses and Mules Boy. We're getting a lot of podcasts here. Recently I had a lot of people show up and I got a lot of opportunities. So we're going to do some podcasts and here today I'm real excited about this one. Guys, we got some folks here I sold a team to here this week and they run a business up in Gettysburg Pennsylvania, a horse tour business, and we're going to dig in with these folks, see how this business got started and just kind of learn a little bit about the carriage business in Gettysburg Pennsylvania. So who do we have with us? I want to talk to all y'all. We're going to tell everybody who each one of y'all are. We actually got three people, so bear with us, guys. We're going to have to pass the mic.

Speaker 2:

Hey, good morning everybody. My name is Doug Stevens. I own Horse Tours of Gaysburg. I'm here with my son, spencer, and our executive director of Horseback Riding, jamie. Well, that's a big title.

Speaker 3:

You know what he just made that up?

Speaker 4:

That's a good title Hi, I'm Spencer. I'm the manager of the Victorian Carriage Company, which is also under Horse Tours of Gaysburg.

Speaker 3:

And I'm Jamie. Apparently, I'm the executive director of Horseback Riding and I just got a promotion, so that's great.

Speaker 1:

Now let's dig a little deeper. You are, yeah, I'm Doug's son. You're Doug's son.

Speaker 4:

His youngest son.

Speaker 1:

And Jamie is your.

Speaker 4:

My girlfriend soon to be wife, hopefully.

Speaker 1:

Uh-oh, no proposals.

Speaker 4:

That's the plan. That's the plan no proposals on the podcast.

Speaker 3:

Let the podcast, know that there's not a ring on the finger.

Speaker 4:

yet it's the plan. To be clear, the plan.

Speaker 1:

Tell the story how y'all met. You told me that story and it's a cool story.

Speaker 3:

It's my favorite one to tell, so I'll take the mic for that. And that is a. It's a cool story, it's my favorite one to tell, so I'll take the mic for that. So I had just saw a sponsored Facebook ad for their company because we hire well, they hire seasonal employees for every season, of course and so it was three hours away from where I was currently living and I said you know, I want to get back into horses. I don't know how to drive a carriage. It'd be a new skill to learn. I'm just going to shoot my shot and apply. So I did, and I drove three hours down to interview and I parked the car and I got out and Spencer was walking up the hill and Spencer's six foot 11. So I get out of my car and I look up and up and up and up, and I said, oh, you're just a tiny little thing, aren't you? And he hit me with this big old smile and that was it. We were pretty much inseparable from that day on.

Speaker 3:

We do co-drivers for each carriage shift, so you'll have a lead driver and then, especially when someone like me who had no experience comes on, you're there to take the lines if something happens, or to jump down and help a guest or head the horses or anything like that. So there's always two drivers there for safety. So every shift, if I could switch my shifts around to be spencer's co-driver, I was doing it, man, anything to just get some alone time with him. And that's how it was. We just became really good friends and you know, yeah, now I'm a better driver than him. Is what he meant to say? Yeah, yep, now he's the co-driver and I'm the lead driver spencer, you're 611.

Speaker 1:

Yes, in case of county, here there's not many, there's nobody. 611. When you got out that day, I don't think henry ever saw anybody as tall as you in person I thought he looked scared of me.

Speaker 4:

I didn't know for sure.

Speaker 1:

I was trying to be friendly and he said that's the tallest man I've ever seen. I said he's tall, but you know it put a perspective to me. I watch basketball all the time, nba basketball and I'm like 6'11". You hear that all the time. You'd be short compared to some of those guys.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, those guys are like 7'4" some of them and Henry's little kids.

Speaker 1:

they come in. They ask me, they say he is tall. I thought that was funny. So how long have you been driving horses, Spencer?

Speaker 4:

Since I was eight years old. Eight years old is when we, the whole family well, when I was eight, the whole family decided to learn how to drive carriages because of dad and everything. The company the horseback company started first where we started taking people around tours of the battlefield and stuff like that. And then dad got hurt on his last deployment and overseas and stuff. But he still wanted to be interacting with the horses and all that type of stuff because horses are very therapeutic. But he wasn't able to ride at the time. Now he is, thankfully.

Speaker 4:

But so he's like okay, let's all go learn how to drive a carriage. So we went down and started learning and I really took to it when I was eight because I, being 6'11" quickly I grew horses that I could ride but I could sit on a carriage with any horses and that just became kind of my passion in driving horses. It was really fun and I learned how to drive a horse before a car. And I mean, I know you know that, but up in pennsylvania that isn't a thing anymore besides the amish community it's not and now I'm able to teach that to 30 new employees every year. It's kind of really cool that it's not a dying school anymore, you know let's take a moment to thank dad here for his service.

Speaker 1:

We love our veterans here. Thank you for your service.

Speaker 2:

We appreciate you. You, you're welcome, thank you.

Speaker 1:

What was you in? Tell the folks what branch.

Speaker 2:

I started out in the Army and I went into the Air Force. I was a combat medic in the Army and became a helicopter medic and then went to fixed wing. I ended up doing six deployments between Afghanistan and Iraq and halfway around the world everywhere else. So we were busy.

Speaker 1:

You're a second veteran in a row, our halfway around the world, everywhere else, so we were busy. You're a second veteran in a row, our last guy from long island, new york, was a veteran.

Speaker 2:

Oh cool, that's really interesting.

Speaker 1:

Yep, so you have. You been around horses your whole life?

Speaker 2:

nope, nope, my daughter was about 14 years old and she got interested in horses. So we said we only got a couple years before she gets her license. Well, if we want her to stick around, we better get our horse so you started this business?

Speaker 1:

in what year? Officially, our first customers were 2010 so you've been going 15 years strong. And then did you start spencer right in with him in 2010, helping or yeah yes, yeah, that was the horseback side.

Speaker 4:

I was obviously a lot younger then, but it was only the five of us family because I got mom, obviously, and a brother and sister as well, and we were the only employees then, and at the time we lived about an hour and a half from Gettysburg.

Speaker 4:

So every morning we woke up really early, like 4 in the morning, get all the horses ready, load on the trailer, drive an hour and a half to Gettysburg for like a 9 am ride and then sit there for three rides which are two hours each. We do an hour break in between and then we come all the way home, get food on the road, get home at like midnight, go to bed, wake up the next morning for 4 am and do it again. So after a few years of that, dad and mom got kind of tired of driving all the time. So they found a place up there and we started living up in gettysburg, which made everything a lot easier. Not that you have to, not that it isn't hard still, but it's a lot easier than driving an hour and a half both ways I love the history of gettysburg.

Speaker 1:

I love the. You know it's got to be a cool place. I've never been. I do have a cousin mitchell shout out to my cousin. Mitchell, first cousin, moved to gettysburg a few years ago and I do do need to go see him. He's been wanting me to, so I'm going to come see you all someday.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, you're more than welcome to. I mean, you've got to come in and check on the team you just sold us.

Speaker 1:

Well, we want to do a YouTube video together.

Speaker 4:

Like.

Speaker 1:

I'm going to come up there and check on you. It'd be cool, it'd be awesome.

Speaker 4:

I think the folks would like. It always says gaysburg is a small town with a global reputation. Yeah, oh, I did right. Uh, but it's, it's a small town. It's very pretty, very quaint and everything but gaysburg gets about three to 3.5 million visitors every year, so it gets busy, and it gets busy quick and come fall time, after like holiday season starts, it gets back to small town roots real quick as well.

Speaker 1:

But well, I've learned a lot about this kind of talking to you guys the past couple days. Not only do you do carriage rides at Gettysburg, you do historic tours.

Speaker 4:

Yeah yeah, we have a licensed Baffle Guide on every one of our tours. It's a two-hour carriage tour through the battlefield.

Speaker 1:

So folks that come to you, if you're coming to Gettysburg, check out this place, Horse Tours of Gettysburg. Check out this place, Horse Tours of Gettysburg. Tell them kind of what all goes on. You've got the carriages, You've got the horseback rides. If they don't want to do that, I heard they can just come take a car tour too.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, we do car tours as well and we also do walking tours of the town as well. Any way you can think to go around the battlefield, you can do it and try to be as inclusive as we can, because you've got a lot of people that like horses but are scared to ride, and that's where the carriages come into play. And you've got some people that just don't like horses in general, which you know.

Speaker 4:

I don't know why, but if people don't you've got a car tour or you've got the walking tour and stuff that goes through the town and Gainsborough's kind of divided between the town and the battlefield. The battlefield is much, it's just open land and stuff like that and very, you know, open and monuments and everything. It's very beautiful but people kind of forget that the battle happened straight through the town as well. Yeah, like the Union Army retreated straight through town and you got gun marks and cannon holes and stuff throughout the whole town itself, which is pretty neat.

Speaker 1:

And it was the bloodiest battle in history, wasn't it?

Speaker 4:

No, it's the bloodiest battle in North America. Yeah, yeah, it's the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, and even A single day was Antietam, yeah a single day was Antietam, but even let alone, I think July 2nd was the third bloodiest day. Yeah, but each 34,000 casualties.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, throughout those three days it was uh, it's kind of weird we say this all the time. It was a very destructive and deadly battle and you know, horrible place during the time. But now you go out there because it's protected and it's beautiful. It's great that this place is protected, but now you go out there it's kind of hard to imagine this big battle, this big war, happening there because it's just butterflies, wildflowers, deer, and it's just, it's very, uh, peaceful.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, now we was in here, um, while y'all was out driving man, your dad was and I was just looking at pictures of gattysburg. It's gorgeous, the sun sets over that battlefield. I was showing him. He said oh yeah, that's it, that's how it looks.

Speaker 3:

So the sun rises. Yeah, next level, what level? What?

Speaker 1:

is how many? Let's talk about horses. How many teams are y'all running right now? Like, how many teams do you have at the carriage barn?

Speaker 4:

Well, with the new team, we have nine now.

Speaker 4:

So, yeah, we have nine teams. We were not so much on the breed. I mean not that I am definitely partial to gray Peritrons, but we have gray Peritrons, black Peritrons, we've had Belgians, spotted drafts, clydesdales, stuff like that. I know very much about the temperament because, like I've told Steven, we deal a lot with traffic, with rangers, lights on double-decker buses, rvs. We're going past cars all the time. Cannons, cannons yeah, they do. They do Living history that they shoot cannons on the battlefield all the time to make people see, or have people see, what cannon was like. The horses learn how to deal with cannons as well and gunshots and stuff.

Speaker 1:

When they do a reenactment. Are you running tours?

Speaker 4:

Yes, but they don't do reenactments on the battlefield. They do the living history, where they shoot one or two cans at a time, but full-on fighting where they're shooting at each other, that isn't allowed to happen on the battlefield. So that's about three miles away, really.

Speaker 1:

Why is that?

Speaker 4:

Because it's supposed to.

Speaker 2:

They believe that there's thousands of bodies still on the battlefield unmarked and so anywhere you walk could possibly actually be an unmarked grave because they buried them where they fell. For the most part, I mean, they made maps but not all the maps were actually accurate and they did try to recover them Years after the battle. They recovered a lot of confidants and took them down to Richmond to the Hollywood Cemetery. There's a big segment of folks that were killed in Gettysburg down there. But even I think it was 1996 it was one of the most recent bodies. They were able to find someone's walking along and saw a bone sticking out of the side of the hill by the railroad cut and they determined it was a confederate soldier. And a few years ago there was a boy scout walking along the trail that actually we use on the horseback and he found a bullet laying there.

Speaker 2:

So it's very close to the surface still. Even a lot, a lot of the trees. They're what we call witness trees. They were here at the time of the battle. If a branch gets broken because of a storm and the park service comes to cut them up, quite often their chainsaws will hit. Bullets are stuck in it from 100 and uh was 153 years ago or whatever it was. Yeah, 162. Yeah, 162 years ago.

Speaker 4:

They said there was like 17 million bullets were fired.

Speaker 2:

Yeah enough to fill a tri-axle dump truck.

Speaker 1:

It's really amazing and if you sit and think about it, so you like living history every day. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

We are very privileged to be the if you want to say the present-day caretakers of the park and of the history, and able to share it to people all around the world. And with us, on the horseback or carriage, we go at the speed of history. We go at the time that they developed the park. The wayside markers along the road are actually angled to be viewed from a carriage, not from a car. That's the time.

Speaker 1:

It has to mean something to you, though, being a military veteran and owning this business in Gettysburg.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, gettysburg has a huge veteran community and the people that come, we call them our guests or our customer. They're very big on prior service. I mean everybody comes there because it's very interesting to see, as a veteran, a battlefield that at one time was hell on earth, literally for people and their suffering. But because of the struggles it united a country and united a people from both the north and the south, and to this day you can go there and see the calm and the peace that has happened because of that struggle and because of the people's sacrifices.

Speaker 4:

The military still uses it for trading, calm and the peace.

Speaker 2:

that has happened because of that struggle and because of the people's sacrifices. Quite often carnal barracks is where they teach people to get ready to become generals and they come down quite often. That's not too far away and we have west point comes down all the time. They do a battlefield tours and we do staff rides, also on the horseback, where the group of the staff officers of a command will come out and we talk about the battle and strategic uniqueness, about the battle, about command and making your enemy react to you. You know all this kind of strategy. In fact, it was originally developed with five towers. They could climb up and be able to see the battlefield from a distance. Now we only have two and a half, but it's been used for over a hundred years as a learning tool.

Speaker 1:

My cousin that moved there to Gettysburg, his son, which is my second cousin. He's a military nut. Like historian, he's a genius, I'll go ahead and say it he is. Anyway, he's a genius and he loved reenactments. He got into it up there at Gaisburg doing reenactments and he also come down here to Mill Springs. There's Mill Springs Battlefield just like 20 miles from here.

Speaker 4:

We're familiar with.

Speaker 2:

Perryville.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I know Perryville was a big battle. Well, the Battle of Mill Springs is just 20 miles behind that window from you and it's a Zollicoffer, general Zollicoffer. You have to check it out. But yeah, you got the Battle of Perryville. You all stayed in Perryville while you was here.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, we got a family in Perryville.

Speaker 1:

A lot of history. It's crazy really. So let's get back on horses. We can talk about this historic stuff a lot. I enjoy it. But you got nine teams. How many carried? Do you run more than one carriage at once, or how? What's your daily? What's your daily routine with rides?

Speaker 4:

I guess I'm saying so it depends on the day, but weekdays we have two carriages going out. Right now we're hoping to get up to four carriages at a time. We just need more horses again, hence why we're here buying from haste. But we have two carriages that go out for two tours two hours each a day, so we have four carriage rides going out, and it's 10 people per each ride, so we take 40 people a day. Come saturday and sundays, though, we have three carriages going out, two rides each, so we have six rides going out, six two hours each, so we can have 60 people out a day.

Speaker 1:

So I'm trying to picture this in my mind. I've not been there yet, but I'm going. Do you have a barn close to the battlefield where you do tours, or how does this work? Or do you haul in steel or what so?

Speaker 4:

yeah, we have a property right outside the national park limits. It's actually still battlefield because the national park doesn't own the whole battlefield it was so there was a. The farm that we actually rent and operate out of was part of the South Cavalry battlefield, so it's kind of neat that where our horses stay now there's an actual cavalry fight there now. Yeah, and on one of the ridges right above the property there's actually still cannons. The park owns a little slither of land with cannons that overlook the horses. So it's like we're keeping the horses in check. You know, threaten them with cannon fire, yeah. But our guests show up to our property down there on Emmitsburg Road that's where the carriages leave from and they park there. We hop on the carriage. We have a barn, we take the carriages straight out of them, hook the horses up.

Speaker 3:

We harness and hitch.

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah. Yeah, that's fair too. We get the horses from our home field slash farm north of town. We get them dressed and harnessed and put them in a trailer, take them down to the barn down there, because the property that we leave out of is where our trail horses stay, because it has a nice corral and stuff. So we catch the trail horses there and then we trailer the trail horses out to the battlefield as well.

Speaker 1:

Wow. So how close is your house to the barn?

Speaker 4:

About 10 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes you drive up to the barn every day yeah, it's uh, the one is on the south side of the town, the one's on the north side of town, so it's you just gotta cross town, but not too bad I gotta get up there and see all this now.

Speaker 1:

Y'all are making me interested.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, these are some of our horses actually spend the whole summer on the battlefield itself.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, yeah, the talking about the battlefield before the park rents a lot of properties out for horses, pastures or farming, and talking about how close the battlefield is to everyone. The park has strict rules about how they can farm the fields, Like they can't go down deep and tell it up because there's still active artillery shells and stuff out there, so they have to be very careful when they farm.

Speaker 1:

Let's talk about the horseback riding now with miss jamie well, good thing I'm the executive director of that.

Speaker 3:

That's right, you are how many?

Speaker 1:

let's talk about your trail, right. How many riding horses are y'all using right now on the string or whatever you want to call it?

Speaker 3:

we have about 31 so we can rotate. We take 19 out for a full day and then within that 19 we rotate, so everyone can get a day off. Most of them only work about two days a week.

Speaker 1:

So how long do you have different lengths of rides, or how does that work?

Speaker 3:

It's the same as the carriage where we do three. They're all two-hour rides. We do three of them out at horseback, yeah, so we start our day a little earlier than carriages. It's much harder work. If you're asking me, we report at that barn where we rent, the one that Spencer was just talking to. We keep all of our trail horses there.

Speaker 3:

So the crew shows up in the morning, we dump grain in the corral, we bring all 31 horses in. We have a list of the 19 that are going out that morning. So they all wear biothane halters with a tag on them with their name. So you grab the 19 halters of the horses that are going out that day. When they're in there eating their grain, you halter them all up. We load up two different trailers. We have a trailer that hauls 11 and one that hauls eight, so that's our 19. We load them up and we go out to a campground on the battlefield which is kind of our base of operation for the day. We unload there, groom tack and then that's where our guests would come and meet us. We do the three tours untack, load up, go home. It's a long day, a lot of work. You get really buff and really tan by the end of the summer.

Speaker 1:

I would say so. So you've been doing it with them how long? Now? Two years.

Speaker 3:

Yes, sir, yep.

Speaker 1:

Wow, how.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, we try to cross-train because a lot of people, a lot of our applicants, come for horseback, because everyone loves to ride a horse.

Speaker 1:

Okay, yeah.

Speaker 3:

And no one really has driving experience. So we do kind of like to get our hooks into them and teach them how to drive so everyone can do everything. If you know a shift needs filled or something like that, you have a couple that, oh no, no, I just like to stay on horseback or no. I can only do carriage. But pretty much all 30 employees are pretty interchangeable.

Speaker 1:

What type of horses are you using for these horseback rides?

Speaker 3:

It's a mix Lots of just randoms, a lot of quarter horses, some of the retired carriage horses. We take kind of a mix of lights all the way to heavies and we got just little crosses, light riding horses. We have one that's like a weird standard bred cross thing. We got some paints, we got quarters. We go all the way to Belgians. Yeah, we can't do gated, no thoroughbreds because they're too fast for our pace.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, percheron crosses, just kind of whatever If it's a good size and a good mind, we can find a spot for it for sure.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's all temperament. So if they have the right temperament to go out there, then we don't really care much about breed.

Speaker 1:

When me and Henry first started together actually doing this was in 2022. He came on board with me full time and then in 2023, we sold some teams and I went out to Meadview lake, arizona, to the grand canyon, to grand canyon west ranch, and I sold them a team of belgians to do their thing with. They do a sunset tour to go on top in the desert, on top of big mountain and watch the sunset and this guy named cowboy dave plays guitar and sings up there that's cool, it's pretty awesome.

Speaker 1:

But they had a trail riding business there and I stayed there three days in a little cabin right behind where they did the trail rides and it blew my mind. They got a step that puts everybody on.

Speaker 1:

They get on and they tie the reins in like a knot like a stick and you hold on to this little stick and they tell you you either go this way or this way or this way to stop. And that's how everybody rides one hand like this. How do you go about that? I mean, I know you got you got a lot of new riders all the time. I mean, do you give them directions?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and they don't listen. But we try. We try to set them up to be safe out there. Yeah, that is the most challenging part, and the main function of our job as outriders or wranglers or whatever you want to call them, is to keep an eye on the guests and be safety conscious, because more often than not, each ride you're dealing with 15 people who have never been on a horse before. So before we give them their horse assignments, we jump on a horse and we do what we call a safety briefing or a demo.

Speaker 3:

We grab a horse, we mount up, we say, hey, this is your reins, this is how you steer, stop, keep your heels down, kind of try to go over the basics. A lot of the times what we've been having recently is people are not used to being in the saddle for two hours and they're definitely dehydrated. So we really try to drive home the point like, hey, sit upright in your saddle, because you get the kind of sack of taters off to one side and then people just ride two hours crooked and don't know any better. I guess, yeah, but yeah, we get them on with the mounting block. We get them off with the mounting block and we try to hold their hand through the whole process. But I mean, horses are live animals with minds of their own, so all we can do is try to give them the tools and the skills to have a good, fun, safe ride out there.

Speaker 3:

But there is a portion where, okay, here you go. You know, you've got to kind of trust them to listen to you and follow your direction. I just had a day you had a kid that just said I don't want to control the horse. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He threw his reins over his horn and said I don't want to control her, and so she was in the grass every four seconds. So, yeah, I clipped the lead rope to her and ponied her off my horse. But people do try and, and every now and then you get rides where people oh, yeah, I've ridden, yep, I'm, I have horse experience and those rides are great because it's like oh great, I don't need to babysit anyone, everyone knows what they're doing.

Speaker 2:

So I could see from what you do, though you learn every day oh, absolutely you learn something, and it's always something new yeah, I like that definitely not something not to do, that's that's true, we're trying to mix the history into the tour that they're having fun, they're learning, don't even realize it, they're. They're out there on the actual trails that are documented through photographic evidence that these were where general lee was or general longstreet was, and the guide who does this study and the testing apparently it's harder than the bar test to become a lawyer is what we've been told many times. But they gather and they portray the story in such a way that people will turn around to look behind them to see if General Pickett is riding up, galloping up to talk to General Longstreet, because they are so passionate about how they speak and how they can draw you into the history now. So that's really really good and really interesting. That's why we love it. We don't want someone to come up and just give a canned speech that this happened here, that happened there. No, tell us what they were like, tell us who they were doing, tell them where they were thinking, what was going on around them as we ride, because you're on the exact ground, you can see what they could see. We ride on the military crest and you have to explain to people what that is and how you can ride and be close to the action but not be seen because there's only line of sight. At that time most cans were about two to three mile range. So you need to be away from that kind of stuff.

Speaker 2:

But getting back to the horses that we use, we want the horses to be fit. They're like athletes because we do six hours a day. You can't just take any horse and put them out there and do six hours. When we first started, the gravel they use is called antiem base. We would literally wear our horseshoes that there was nothing in the front, it was the steel just gone. But we also prepare the horses and what we feed them. We give them high fat so you can have the energy to be out there, but not hot food to make them hot and excitable. We want them to be nice and calm so that way people aren't afraid to be out there and riding. That's a huge thing. You build it for the person that's not experienced, so they can be out there and be very comfortable.

Speaker 2:

When we first started we didn't know what was going to happen with the business, but the story that my wife and I learned was a woman came out. I forget exact details. It was three or four children. She had a king with her, it says to be blunt cancer sucks. She was dying from cancer and she was doing her bucket list with her kids. Her kids were like between 12 and 15, probably a couple girls, a couple boys. They hated the world. They hated the world because their mom's dying. They knew their mother was dying. They just hated the world. We tried to get them into going into the ride. Hey, are you excited? They're non-off-lack. They just didn't care.

Speaker 2:

By the time we got back, they were singing on top of spaghetti and they were showing us their karate moves. They were having such a good time. We knew their karate moves. They're having such a good time. This is we knew for a fact that they were going to remember this for the rest of their lives, no matter how long their mom lived and we knew didn't matter. Whatever happened from that point forward with their business, we felt successful because we're able to make a difference in people's lives.

Speaker 2:

you know we're living outside. You know so many people are used to just now playing video games and people don't talk to each other anymore, they text. So getting out there and talking to people face-to-face and asking them about themselves and you know a lot of people have connections. Quite often we have people that great-great-grandfather fought here or something like that. It's really really interesting to hear their stories. So that makes it interesting for me too.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you brought up a good point there. People don't talk anymore, they text. You know I text a lot of people. I do. I have to with this business. But I've got on our website call, Call me.

Speaker 1:

I would rather somebody pick up that phone and call me and around here we don't see that. You know I'm with yeah, I'm not Mennonite or Amish, I'm with them every day. My wife's not Mennonite or Amish. Me and her text throughout the day. But you know, all of my contacts in this community that I'm with are Mennonite and Amish and me and Henry can't text each other. We never have, we don't. He's Mennonite, he don't have a cell phone we call. The other night we did a conference for our horse sale we're having and there's five board members. I called them all into the phone on a six-way call, added everybody and we had a two-hour conversation. You know, when the youth gets together here in this community the mennonites and stuff they meet all together. There's a lot of face-to-face interaction. Did you know that is the reason behind a lot of the mennonites and amish not owning a phone? Because it takes away, takes away face-to-face communication with people.

Speaker 1:

That's the reason, and you know, when you want to see somebody and have a meeting with them, you want the Mennonites and Amish, they want you to have to go to them, because that's the true way to meet somebody talk to them and get the point across. And that's a good point. I like that. That's yeah, it's the world's.

Speaker 2:

Went to texting like crazy and they don't have the personnel they don't have. They really don't have the skills. They don't know how to read somebody when you're talking to them.

Speaker 2:

Are they receiving what you're trying to say or are you using the words that they understand the point that you're trying to get across? It's very difficult, but that's what's good about getting outside. It's a family, it can be a family activity, and our carriages it's like they're bench seats that face each other. It's a group talk. The guys there are talking about stuff that you can communicate right across the room, like you and I are right now, and talk about what's interesting to you and what you're learning about. It's just personal stories, personal connections. That's what makes it so interesting, not just repeating words or stories you read in a book. It's the personal individual that makes it very interesting.

Speaker 4:

And that's a skill that I learned I didn't realize I needed to learn, comparatively to my group of kids in high school, especially talking to all these people doing these tours and stuff, since I was 8 years old and you know you don't realize how many people you talk to, but it's well into the thousands, of, tens of thousands of people I've met and talked to. And it's funny because the first few years and stuff we're doing it was more of a weekend type, company type, stuff like that. And I go back to high school and look and like we were just talking about all these kids are only texting all the time and you go to have a conversation and they look they can talk to you for like a minute or two and then they're back on the phone. It's like so it's.

Speaker 4:

It's one of the skills that you're like wow, you don't know how to talk to people, you don't. You don't know how to public speaking stuff and not. That stuff isn't nerve-wracking like it can be for anyone, but there's a point that you understand that it's okay, you can talk. It's not everyone's going to be mean to you, not everyone's going to be judging. You can have a normal conversation and have a great conversation with someone you've met maybe a minute ago, kind of just like how it was when we got here with you, stephen.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah, you know I feel I talk to people every day. So meeting people and meeting customers is nothing new to me. You know I'm used to it. But there are some customers you feel like the vibe. There's a vibe, you know you got common interest. Some people's just cool.

Speaker 3:

We're vibing yeah.

Speaker 1:

And y'all since you walked in here. You know, since you pulled in in your truck, I felt a vibe. You know it's cool, we're on the same page. It's fun. We've had a great time.

Speaker 3:

We had a good meal thursday we didn't what steven's not telling y'all is that we're all wearing matching friendship bracelets right now, and they're gorgeous yeah, shout out to bread of life in liberty. Kentucky and uh we enjoyed our meal. That catfish I'll be dreaming about it.

Speaker 1:

That's right. Some people may not realize, guys, we're talking to Spencer and Jamie here and there. How old are you, Spencer? I'm 23.

Speaker 3:

And Jamie I'm a cougar. I'm 32. Proud of it, I'll own it before people make their own assumptions.

Speaker 4:

If it makes it better at heart, I'm like 48.

Speaker 1:

It's true yeah, they're a young couple and you're turning it over to them.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Pretty much. That's what we want they're going to run this business. Do you have anything you want to mention before we go off this and anything you got that you want to tell the folks or anything Anybody before we go off this and anything you got that?

Speaker 4:

you want to tell the folks or anything, anybody, feel free to go ahead and follow. Follow us on Facebook and stuff. At Victorian carriage company horse stores Gaisberg we're looking to really expand our operations, do a lot of town rides and stuff like that and have a brick and mortar building eventually in town. So we're looking for it to expand. We're looking to post a lot more videos and stuff like how Haste does here. If you're looking to see the team that we bought for them, we'll be doing plenty of videos and all that to show off them. And if you guys are in Gaisburg looking to come out, please feel free to come and enjoy the tour. Or if you're looking to drive garages for us or ride horseback, we always have open employment. So open employment like so if you yeah, so if you go on our website and you're interested in that, we have an application on there. Feel free to fill that out folks, you're hearing this.

Speaker 1:

They just offered to open hiring. You know how many people text me daily. Are you hiring? I want to be your apprentice. Wow, hire me, hire me, hire me. Folks call spencer gettysburg horse tours.

Speaker 4:

There, I haven't you need drivers, I'm sure oh yeah, the more drivers we get, the more stuff we can do so but there's a lot of cool people out there older gentlemen and older ladies.

Speaker 1:

Some of the ladies drive better than the men, amen, amen.

Speaker 1:

I've got. I'm telling you there was a lady here from Alberta, canada, over last weekend, miss Anna up in. Oh Lord, I can't remember the town. Forgive me, anna, if you listen to this, but she's like I don't know how old she was. She's a retired police officer, one of the coolest ladies I ever met. She still does all her own hay. She's home right now cutting and baling hay. She's like I got to get my hay put up before I can meet the driver at the border with the horses.

Speaker 1:

This lady is a go-getter. Last Sunday morning, of course, we went to church. She wanted to come here. She was here over Sunday, didn't have nothing to do. You know she's in a cabin. Yeah, I want to drive my horses. I bought. So I told her. I said well, we're going to church, I'll meet you at the barn. You know. Show you what to do. You know. Show you where the horses are. Show you what to do. You know. Show you where the horses are and you drive them while we're at church. Well, I didn't show her nothing. I showed her where her horses was. She grabbed her new horses out, threw the harness on them, walked them over the tongue out here and hooked them to her wagon and off she went.

Speaker 1:

And it's the ladies like that that are tough and you know, if you could get some ladies like that driving for you, probably doing pretty good, yeah, they're more than welcome, send them our way. And like there's a company I know down in shout out to dream carriage in chester, south carolina, gail and her husband mike down there super good people. They've got a wonderful business they're doing and they're actually starting in chester. They just rented a brick and mortar building, they've redone it all and they're going to start a horse tour of chester, south carolina, taking people around the city and talking about the history, kind of like what you're doing. And yeah, there's so many good carriage companies out there and we sell them all the time and you all are just a mix in with them. So welcome to the community, welcome to our family, and we hope you come to our barbecue in October. If you can get away, you've got to come.

Speaker 3:

We're going to try. Yeah, we're definitely going to try.

Speaker 1:

So bring as many people as you want with you and everybody's invited. All'all out there listening. We're having a customer appreciation barbecue. Get together october, oh lord 23rd 23rd, 24th 25th.

Speaker 1:

Thank you, jamie, you're welcome but, guys, if you're in gettysburg, if you're going to pennsylvania, go visit these people. They're super good people and they deserve your business. Go help them out, go take a ride with them. They won't let you down. And they just bought a new team from us. I don't know if they're renaming them or not. We had some talks about it. I don't know if they decided or not. Did you decide?

Speaker 3:

They'll have to watch a video and find out. Stay tuned.

Speaker 4:

No, we have not decided. Gosh, jamie, that was good.

Speaker 1:

That was good. Yeah, that's some very good advertising there. Guys, encourage Spencer and Jamie to start this YouTube channel.

Speaker 4:

We got a channel. We have like two videos of our training videos on there.

Speaker 1:

Okay, we'll tell them the channel.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it's Horse Tours of Gettysburg.

Speaker 3:

There's a video of Spencer harnessing up a horse. You can see just how tall he is.

Speaker 1:

He makes that percheron look like a pony. Go give that a watch and there'll be more videos posted. We want to get Spencer and Jamie doing videos every week and get a channel going. It'll be awesome.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, that's a goal in hubs when you've got time.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, if these horses would stop needing fed every day, we'd have the time.

Speaker 1:

I'm calling it now on this podcast. You do it, spencer. A channel, you get going. I'm calling it it now.

Speaker 4:

it's going to be awesome and it's going to get a lot of views and a lot of subscribers that'll be awesome.

Speaker 4:

So I definitely want to try that and that's uh and, as you know, doing all the marketing here for haste, that the more and more you can do, it just brings more and more attention to you and like what we kind of hinted at before, not having people in the world driving carriages and stuff like this, the more and more we can get it out there, like the company South Carolina and stuff, the better it is. The more it's around, the more the people see it, the more we're kind of bringing that back into the modern day world that people just are on the phone all the time. They don't see the beauty of all these big, beautiful draft horses and or riding horses, you know anything like that.

Speaker 1:

Also, not many people see a big giant like Spencer throwing this harness and driving these horses. You'll be a hit, spencer. You'll be a hit hey.

Speaker 4:

I'm Tony. We got to post that video of you and I walking down the hallway. I'm going to put it on. We'll do it. We're going to put it on there.

Speaker 1:

No, we're going to save it, because I'm going to come to Gettysburg and do a video with y'all.

Speaker 4:

Okay, there you go.

Speaker 1:

And we'll put it on that one. I'm going to give you a few months to get your horses going.

Speaker 3:

It shouldn't take that long those are good horses. They've got a shift to work next month, so they better hurry up.

Speaker 1:

We bought a pair of three-year-olds, though.

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah, that's what we wanted. But, a lot of people don't realize. Most of these carriage companies in the world are using 20-plus. That's right. When we try to retire, about 20 years old is when our horses go to relax.

Speaker 1:

I mean, obviously it depends on each horse, but if they're doing, healthy and all that they get to retire and go home by then. Most of these carriage companies want a retired deadhead to drive on carriage though, because they're so laid back, you know.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we want something with some spirit. We want animals with some spirit, just because it just feels confident to have animals that are confident with every step they take. There are some hills in Gettysburg heard of little round top, maybe that was kind of famous from the movie with the 20th main. But we do the irish brigade, the irish hill things like that where you need a little bit of oomph behind them. And even in the town, yeah, in the town of gaysburg, there's some hills there too who's running this while you're gone?

Speaker 1:

is anything going on?

Speaker 2:

you just took a vacation it's bike week, motorcycle bike week, and there's thousands of motorcycles, and not the horses aren't afraid of the motorcycles, it's just the drone of the sound. You can't communicate and talk with each other. So we realize it's not a good product for the tour for the guy to be able to talk and communicate, and it's a good break right in the middle of our prime season to go ahead and let the horses have a break. We have a break to go get some other stuff done and then we come back fresh on Monday morning.

Speaker 1:

So it really worked out good.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, that's why, when Jamie first came in contact with you, it's like, hey, this is when we're going to be there and this is when we're leaving. There's no window for us to be at Altower, yeah.

Speaker 1:

I see, yeah Well.

Speaker 4:

I wondered about, worked out great, and that's another thing we just really appreciate of you and henry. Let us come down here and, as you know, buying horses yourself, being able to see them and drive them or be in person with them, you really get to be understanding what you're getting in and made it nice and well yeah, and I don't know if steven has mentioned this, but we actually put a deposit down on a different team.

Speaker 3:

we were excited to come down and meet and as soon as we held the lines on the team that we bought, we knew, I mean, that was the team we were going home with. So there's so many good animals here and so many good teams, but the best way to do it is to come here, drive them, take your time and these guys will answer all your questions. We had a wonderful experience with y'all.

Speaker 4:

We drove three teams ourselves and, I think, the group of people over here from San Diego. They drove eight, ten teams.

Speaker 1:

A lot of teams.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, because they drove the Halflingers too. I think that one was just for fun, they drove the Halflingers around. I think they're still going to buy them.

Speaker 1:

Oh hey, good for you, he's coming. Those people are cool people too. Shout out to Happy Trails, Ponyland, San Diego, California. We got along super good with them. We was going to ship the horses to them, you know Well, he flew home. He called me last night. He's driving here to get them. He's coming back Bringing his freight liner and his trailer. We're going to load him up. I'm going to try to sell him a whole load when he gets back if you got empty space, you might as well fill it up.

Speaker 1:

I'm actually gonna do. I'm gonna make him do a podcast. He don't know it yet, but if you listen to this, you're gonna do a podcast with me when you get here. So shout out to you and I thank you all so much. We appreciate all of our customers, all of them.

Speaker 2:

One thing steven didn't tell us before we came down is that they have Airbnbs available right here in Casey County, Kentucky. That makes it so much easier than having to drive from Danville down or some other town that's all crowded with all kinds of events. It would have been nice to be out here in the country and be able to relax and enjoy the beautiful knobs of Kentucky.

Speaker 4:

You can get more time to spend with your horses that you buy you all.

Speaker 1:

if you're coming in October, you need to reserve our new Airbnb right across the road here.

Speaker 4:

Okay.

Speaker 1:

Get it booked up, unless you want to stay in your trailer and bring a team or something.

Speaker 4:

Oh, there you go. No, I already dumped it in the trailer as it is.

Speaker 1:

But yeah, you need. Well, we got a bed on the picture yeah, okay good, you just have to turn side yeah, diagonal or hang your feet off the end. Yeah, you know, I sleep with my feet off the end of the bed. I'm not even that tall what do you have?

Speaker 1:

two feet in front of you on the top of the bed I don't know why, when, ever since I've been little, I always scoot down in the bed and hang my feet off and my legs from about right below my knee down. I love my feet and legs hanging off the bed. I always slept that way.

Speaker 4:

Hey, you know what works.

Speaker 1:

So you're probably pretty used to it.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, light diagonal or something like that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. For different reasons, but it's in common Guys, we're going to wrap this thing up. It's been a good Sunday morning and we appreciate y'all. We appreciate you and this has been fun. And if you're in Gettysburg, go see these folks Also like their Facebook Horse Tours of Gettysburg.

Speaker 4:

Victorian Carriage. Yes, sir, is that two different Facebooks? Yeah, we actually have three different Facebooks Because we have the Trail Company as Confederate Trails of Gettysburg and then the carriage company as Victorian Carriage Company, and then Horse Tours of Gettysburg is our main one. That highlights all the stuff we do with car tours, walking tours and stuff like that, because Horse Tours is our big company.

Speaker 1:

You have three different avenues here. Yes, sir, so if, you want to go like all three, you can. I'm going to put all three in the description on this podcast Also. I'm going to put all three in the description on this podcast Also. I'm going to put a contact number. Phone number. Call these guys. They called a book, a tour. Is that how that works?

Speaker 4:

They can call the book if they would like, but their online website can walk them through the whole process as well. Perfect Stuff like that.

Speaker 1:

We're going to put the website on, we're also going to tag that YouTube channel and I'm going to issue a challenge to Spencer and Jamie your challenge is issued.

Speaker 4:

What's the challenge? What's our goal?

Speaker 1:

A thousand subscribers by October 1st.

Speaker 4:

Whoa.

Speaker 1:

Okay, you can do it. You can do it, we'll try. I know you can yeah okay. I know you can, and if you need somebody to make you a thumbnail or you know, help you do something, I know somebody that might be able to do that.

Speaker 4:

That'd be awesome. And question if we reach that goal, do we get a free team? There? We go Uh-oh, or get a coupon, discount Coupon.

Speaker 2:

You got a coupon here, not a free team. Okay, we'd.

Speaker 4:

We'll get a free lunch. We'll get a free set of harness.

Speaker 1:

Oh, a free set of harness. That works too. No, you make a YouTube. You get your YouTube going. You get 1,000 subscribers by October. I'm going to give you all haste jackets.

Speaker 4:

Oh okay, you sure you can make one big enough for me. Oh yeah, I'm 5XLT.

Speaker 1:

Some company makes them. Okay, I'm 5XLT.

Speaker 3:

Some company makes them.

Speaker 4:

Oh, yeah, yeah there you go, You're a 5X, 5XLT. Yeah, it's just shoulders and the LT that Tall I can fit into like a 3X, but then it's all a crop top and no one wants to see that. Where do you buy your clothes? Dxl, it's expensive.

Speaker 3:

I'm a tent maker, yeah maker.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, the amish have a harness shop just for me actually, but big and tall store. Yeah, yes, sir, same thing with my boots.

Speaker 2:

It takes like what size are those?

Speaker 4:

there's 18, three wide. So, yeah, they take a while and they're expensive. That's why it's like are y'all hearing this?

Speaker 4:

we got a guy in front of us for the 18 shoe when I order them, they I'll run them until they're done, because they're too expensive, not to, you know, they probably are. Yeah, they're carol. Until they're done because they're too expensive. Not to, they probably are. Yeah, they're Carolinas. They're the only boot that I don't wear cowboy boots at all, or anything like that because they're too narrow, they don't fit. Same thing with cowboy hats. I would love a cowboy hat. They don't make a big enough for my head.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 4:

Fuck it.

Speaker 1:

Either they don't fit or it's all over my face and drowning me. So american hat company in bowie texas shout out to y'all, I would love a podcast sponsorship maybe

Speaker 3:

possibly I wear american hats every day.

Speaker 1:

I'm holding one now in my hand. I have them hanging all around this room. We need a sponsorship. No, I'm joking, I don't want no sponsorship, but american hat Hat Company. If you call them, they'll make you one. Oh, okay, if you've got the size.

Speaker 4:

Wow Big, real big.

Speaker 1:

Too big. That's the official size.

Speaker 4:

Official size too big squared.

Speaker 1:

Guys, thank you for doing this, taking the time this morning. I know you've got a long drive ahead of you, Yep yep Thanks With your new team heading out of here.

Speaker 2:

Before it gets too hot. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Well, I think you're going to have a rainy, cool day. It'll be nice, so it's going to be a good day to do it.

Speaker 4:

We're going to stop at Bucky's on the way in, take the horses out, get a picture. It'll be so good I know, we're looking forward to it.

Speaker 3:

One thing about us. If you didn't learn anything from this podcast, is that we love Buc-ee's. Okay, you can take that to the bank.

Speaker 1:

What about the brisket sandwich at Buc-ee's? I've never been. They're pretty good. You've never been.

Speaker 4:

No, We've only been. Jamie and I went down to visit her mom last winter in Georgia, and that was the only time. There's not one close to Pennsylvania at all the closest one they just built.

Speaker 3:

Three or four hours away, yeah three or four hours away.

Speaker 4:

So we stopped at one time when we went down to visit her mom in Georgia, and then after that first stop, we were there four more times before we left. So dad's never been there. So we're going to stop there and make sure. And, like I said, it's funny, up where we are, everyone wants a Buc-ee's, so if you get to go, it's like a celebrity you could be like oh, look, there's the beaver, you know, so Are you going to get your picture made by the beaver?

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah, I already have you guys. Show them the one picture when we get done.

Speaker 1:

You're taller than the beaver Way taller.

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah, I don't know. If the let's get that close, go home.

Speaker 1:

It would be some good advertisement it would, oh yeah yeah, that would be kind of cool. Thank you for having us.

Speaker 3:

You had a great time and we're already looking forward to buying another team.

Speaker 1:

Yeah I appreciate y'all, and if we can help anybody out there else too, you know we sell horses every day, so you can check out our website at wwwdrafthorsesandmulesforsalecom. Also follow us on Facebook, twitter, tiktok, instagram. The whole nine yards, and my wife does a stellar job running all that social media. Shout out to you, elizabeth, thank you, I appreciate it, and a shout out to Henry and his family for helping make all this possible too, and thank you.

Speaker 3:

Thank you, Steve Horse.

Speaker 4:

Tours of Gettysburg.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and be sure to follow their social media. And everybody stay tuned for Spencer and his big YouTube channel. That's going to happen. And we're going to support him. Go ahead and go to Horse Tours of Gettysburg on YouTube now. Click that subscribe and comment on one of his older videos that you've seen him or heard of him on Harness Up Podcast. Thank you all. God bless. You have a wonderful Sunday. Go to your church, we're going to go to ours and we'll see you soon.

People on this episode

Contributor

Elizabeth Haste

Host
Head Shot

Steven Haste

Host

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