Bint Al Bahr Arabians

Preservation Breeders of Straight Babson Egyptians

Afmaar (Fay-El-Dine x *Maaroufa) foaled in 1946 sired two SBE foals, a 1954 colt and a 1955 filly.  His filly Bulghra (x Fazala) bred on in the programs of Richard Lodwick and Gerald Donahue, producing lines that are still in today’s purebred population.    

Afmaar might best be described as one of the ultimate ambassadors for the Arabian horse for his time. He left the Babson Farm with Bazy Tankersley of Al- Marah Arabians to become a gelding and a cutting horse, a sport for which he was said to have had only a spectator interest.  His delightful patient disposition earned him the important job of teaching all the children on the farm to ride.He was taught to jump and became Bazy’s and her daughter Kristie’s hunter/ jumper.  Bazy tells of Afmaar’s natural ability to chose the safest way over an obstacle was so pronounced that after his 3rd fox hunt, many of the field would follow his lead across the countryside.  He ran in point to point races, competed in Hunter Trials and was shown by children in English and Western Pleasure winning as many ribbons as any horse they had.  He was much loved and made many friends.

  Bazy Tankersley on Afmaar's busy schedule -  "Tell me, do roller skates look good on Arabs?"

Excerpt from Arabian Horse World - March 1981 article on Al-Marah, pages 259-260, photos of Afmaar on page 255

WORLD: Somebody commented that the National driving classes are getting so large, she thought they should now have a dressage pattern or something to make the class harder. She thought that would also make it more fun to watch.

 BAZY: I think she has a point there. On the other hand, I hate to see the horse shows put in too many individual pattern classes. That can get devastatingly dull. If I were going to go into driving more, I'd rather belong to an all-breed driving club, like Tish Hewitt is doing - mostly open competition. The Devon Cross Country and that sort of thing.

One of the most spectacular things any of our horses ever did was to compete successfully in a steeplechase against Thoroughbreds. When you combine the racing with the jumping, that's a pretty tall order. He placed third in a top field of steeplechase Thoroughbreds.  

BAZY: A horse called AFMAAR. He was Babson-bred, but he was one of our horses. (Ed.: Fay-El-Dine x *Maaroufa) He was the horse that taught all of the children to ride, and after they'd all learned to ride, they all wanted to learn to jump. So we taught AFMAAR to jump, and then he taught them all to jump. We also raced him. He never won a race, but he was always a good contender and helped to fill the field. So he had all that fitting and the ability to jump, and we thought, why not put him in the steeplechase? Now if AFMAAR was going to enter, we wanted to have the best pilot in the world on his back. I found out who was the best steeplechase rider in Maryland and I induced him to ride AFMAAR.

 Well, he showed up, and he had his bat in his hand. The jockey on the race track had hit AFMAAR once and he had just quit. So I said to this steeplechase rider, "This is a kid's horse, so don't carry that bat. He won't like it. But if you need something from him, just ask him."  

Well, it was mud, and AFMAAR was no mudder. He ran like a windmill, but he was all heart. Coming up the hill about a mile out, he was in the top three horses when one of them started to crowd him, so he was going to miss the fence and be disqualified. He either had to drop back - and he never would have made it up - or he had to shoot ahead. And that's when you go to the bat. So the jockey just crouched down on him, and thoong! The jockey came back just gibbering and said, "This horse has got more heart than any horse I ever rode, and I want to ride him again!"  

Well, in the meantime we were in the owners' circle and everybody else was saying, "Come on, Joe," or whoever, and all of us were there saying, "Please, God, don't let him fall!" So we said to the jockey, "Oh, no-he's done it!" And we took him home. But I was prouder of that third place than an awful lot of ribbons.

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