It’s rugged country fit more for beast than man. In the remote South Dakota badlands, once sacred to American Indians who stalked buffalo on its plains, coyote howls echo off the walls of deep canyons—and 500 wild mustangs run free, thanks to former bronc rider, bullfighter, cattle rancher and rodeo photographer Dayton O. Hyde.
In the late 1980s, Hyde was driving through California on a trip to buy cattle when he passed a huge government holding pen where wild horses were corralled to protect federal land from excessive grazing. “It made me so mad to see them sad-eyed and dejected that I decided to do something,” says Hyde, now 81.
In 1988, Hyde bought an 11,000-acre ranch near Hot Springs, S.D. (pop. 4,129), to take in and release captured mustangs. He created the Black Hills Wild Horse Sanctuary to protect not just wild horses and the prairies, but also America’s equine heritage.
“These horses represent our Western history,” he says, “and it’s important to keep this link with the past, to keep this old blood alive. Someday we will want to go back to the mustang to re-infuse their ‘smarts’ and hardiness into our domestic horses.”
To keep the sanctuary’s horse population in check, Hyde sells some of the foals each year. Proceeds from the sales and money collected through volunteer-guided tours support the sanctuary, which is one of the few spots in the world where people can see large herds of appaloosas, paints, palominos and other wild horses roaming and romping on the open range, watch golden eagles soaring above sandstone cliffs and witness an age-old American Indian tradition.
Each summer, some 400 Lakota Sioux set up teepees along the Cheyenne River and hold an annual Sun Dance ceremony, a religious ritual honoring community, courage and endurance. “I can hear the drumming and chanting clear down in the prairie house where I live,” says Hyde, who extended an invitation in 1998 for the Sioux to convene on his property.
The sanctuary’s scenery is so spectacular that Ted Turner made the 1995 movie Crazy Horse on Hyde’s property, leaving behind the replica of Fort Robinson built for the production. Disney filmmakers shot scenes of the Wounded Knee massacre for Hidalgo at the sanctuary.
Growing up in Marquette, Mich. (pop. 19,661), far from the Old West, Hyde always was fascinated with horses and ranch life. Eager to become a cowboy, he ran away from home at age 13 to live on his uncle’s Oregon cattle ranch in the late 1930s. Hyde caught and broke mustangs for ranch work and took over his uncle’s spread. Later he became a bronc rider, rodeo clown and rodeo photographer—and a celebrated one at that. Lying flat in the arena and shooting straight up, he captured dramatic, low-angle photos of bucking broncs with all four of their feet off the ground, and often put himself in great danger in pursuit of the perfect image.
“I would get bulls coming over the top of me,” recalls Hyde, whose photos appeared in Life magazine and later were included in his autobiography, The Pastures of Beyond, which detailed his evolution from riding to rodeo, photography and wild-horse ranching.
Today, Hyde’s love of the land and horses has inspired others. Susan Watt visited the sanctuary more than 10 years ago and has been its volunteer program development director ever since. “I was so impressed with what Dayton had done to protect these horses that I wanted to learn as much as I could from him,” says Watt, 58.
Hyde himself has traveled a long way since he was a young cowboy who longed to capture and tame wild horses. Nowadays, all his dreams are about keeping them wild and unfettered.
“I owe these horses a lot of joy in my life,” says Hyde, who has found a way to pay them back. “Now they have a home that can never be developed, where they can race around and be free.”
Visit www.wildmustangs.com for more information.
