Tony Diaz walked the Hank Wiescamp pastures several days a year for many years and knew Hank and his antics very well. Diaz selected Skips Count to "tear up" the west coast with a great Wiescamp horse in every way it could be done. Hank would not sell this quality of horse locally as he did not want to compete with horses where he needed to win with his own horses.
Skips Count was born in 1965 sired by Skippers King and out of a half sister to Skipper W, Skips Sis. Hank sold Skips Count to famous Spanish reinsman, Tony Diaz, formerly of Fame Farms, Clements, CA. Tony had wife and financial troubles and called offering me and my dad, Frank, Skips Count, a daughter of Red Bird Shoemaker, a Skipity Skip mare and 2 beautiful buckskin Music Mount mares. These were mares he had acquired in his years of searching for the very best of the Shoemaker x Wiescamp genetics.
We drove to California with an old rusty steel trailer. Tony, Dad and I walked out into a pasture and were looking at Tony's mares and a deputy sheriff of some sort walked up to us. Said he had a document to repossess all horses owned by Tony Diaz, were these them? I said "No" these are mine, I am Darol Dickinson of Calhan, Colorado, good to meet you. I gave him a business card. He looked a little funny, kicked dirt and left. Within 3 hours we were out of California with Skips Count jammed in this little trailer with these great mares.
It was fun to have a Wiescamp stallion in Colorado who consistently beat Wiescamp's best. Dad and I hauled him all over the country. It was fun. His golden palomino color and all the Wiescamp fine points was very striking. I got beat for Grand by Two Eyed Jack at Omaha, but we were able to beat most of the Wiescamp entries and a lot of other great horses. He won a wall full of trophies, also won AQHA roping. Roger Raisner started him in calf roping. Gary Campbell roped on him at the QH Congress. When a calf hit the end of the rope is was "Nellie bar the door."
This photo was taken on my special photo pasture east of Colorado Springs at Ellicott. When you see this background in hundreds of photos of great horses, note the horizontal irrigation pipe, the wire fence and Pikes Peak in the far back. When you see this background, we were there. Skips Count did an easy rear, side, front and head shot. Few horses were as strong and looked so good from every angle. He was not just good, he was extreme in every point with enough, or more than any critic would ever want. Dad would sit on the hay bunk for hours looking at Skips Count. He sired some beautiful progeny all over the country.
Regardless of my efforts in raising great Quarter Horses (dad and I raised 5 World Champions) I had started raising registered Texas Longhorns. The easier profit, less work, simple marketing, made the Texas Longhorn business far more profitable than horses. In the late seventies we liquidated the brood mare band and now have the largest registered Texas Longhorn herd in the nation. www.texaslonghorn.com. I loved raising great horses, but the competition was too brutal and the profit was too small. Not good.
Hank never ask about Skips Count; never complimented him; never commented on him; never criticized him -- to me.
Author: Darol Dickinson
