I was on the right track in a recent post about the source of rabicano coloring  in cutting horses, but owe a debt of thanks to Burnel Preston, who pointed me to Traveler as a progenitor of that “roaning” pattern.

Described by Bob Denhardt in Quarter Horse (1941, The American Quarter Horse Association) as a “speckled sorrel (who) bred horses that had grey hairs in their tails,” Traveler turned up at the beginning of the last century pulling a dirt scraper, as legend has it, for the Texas and Pacific Railway. He eventually came into the hands of brothers Will and Dow Shely, who put him to stud on their breeding farm south of San Antonio, where he sired three of his most famous sons – Little Joe, Possum and Texas Chief.

Trace beyond Traveler and you’ll hit a dead end. Trace forward and you will corral many of today’s top Quarter Horses. Traveler appears on the top and the bottom of King’s pedigree and four times in the fourth generation of Poco Bueno. He also shows up in both the sire and dam of San Siemon (who had white hairs on his flanks). San Siemon is the dam’s sire of Leo San, whose sire, Leo’s also traces to Traveler through the second dam of his sire, Joe Reed II.