Remembering Dick and Vita Thompson

As great as last week was for our sport, the eventing world was saddened by the passing of legendary owner, announcer and eventing supporter Dick Thompson last week.  EN reader Emily Henderson knew the Thompsons through her grandparents, and they helped inspire her to try eventing.  Emily was kind enough to send us a brief remembrance of the Thompsons.  Our takeaway from this guest post is the wonderful impact that supporters of our sport such as the Thompsons can have on the lives of so many eventers.  If you have something to share, send it to [email protected].

—————-

 

Emily and "Peepers" at the Radnor Hunt PC HT

 

From Emily:

 

My grandparents, Joan and Gerry Henderson have been best friends with Dick and Vita Thompson for over 40 years. They have spent a few weeks together each year for countless years on the island of St. Barths/St. Martin. When I first got into eventing, 10 years ago, my grandparents were already quite fond of the discipline because of the Thompson’s and their huge involvement in the sport. My grandparents knew mainly of Biko, the horse of the century! They gave me a poster of the eventing team that participated in the Atlanta Olympic games (including Karen and Biko). This poster was signed by Karen, David, and even Biko and given to my grandparents who then passed it on to me. That was it for me; eventing was now my life and I wanted to be like the icons standing on the podium in this poster.

 

I was so scared when I first met Vita, a big time woman in the eventing world, and I was just a little girl who had just begun my beginner novice career. She was in a golf cart doing some sort of radio work for the big Radnor Event held each year. She was so busy, but stopped what she was doing to tell me all about her horses and even a bit about Karen. Not so scary anymore! She told me to look for the big tower and that Dick would be up there announcing all weekend. My first novice event was at the Radnor Hunt Pony Club. It was just a schooling horse trials but Dick Thompson was announcing. My grandparents had informed him that I was going to be competing that day. He made a special effort to announce EVERY jump I conquered on that hugmongous novice course (that now seems so tiny)! I had trouble focusing on my course because I was just so thrilled to hear my name on the loud speaker- good thing I was on an eventing schoolmaster. The Thompson’s have been such an important part of the Eventing world, as well as my grandparents lives (and even mine). It is heartbreaking to hear of another loss in the eventing world but such a joy to know all of the grand things that the Thompson’s did for our community. So here’s to them; truly missed but never forgotten.

 

-Emily Henderson

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments