Back to News The Swedish Warmblood of North America December 4, 2009 Master SWB - rider Kyra Kyrklund. The Swedish Warmblood horse is one of the oldest Warmblood breeds in the world. Horses have been bred in Flyinge since the 12th century, when the Danish Archbishops held a fortified stronghold with mounted troops there. After the Swedes negotiated a peace treaty in Roskilde in 1658, King Carl X Gustaf ordered the establishment of a Royal Stud at Flyinge. While most Warmbloods were initially bred primarily for agriculture and carriage horses, Swedish Warmbloods were bred specifically for riding. The military selected stallions which could produce comfortable and rideable horses for the army, carefully choosing thoroughbred and other Warmblood stallions to introduce desirable characteristics. Farmers owned the mares, breeding offspring suitable for purchase by the army. This was the classic model for modern Warmblood breeding. The Swedish Warmblood Association (SWA) was formed in 1928 with the encouragement of the Army. Their main purpose was the development of high and uniform quality mares. When the Army ceased using horses in the 1970s, the breeding program was transferred into the hands of the SWA. The official Swedish Warmblood website (in English) is www.warmblood.se. The AVSH is the official Swedish Warmblood registry. The only other country, outside of Sweden, where official Swedish Classification of mares and stallions takes place, is the USA. SWANA (Swedish Warmblood of North America) has its own website, www.swanaoffice.org. The following commentary covers the early years of the formation of SWANA up until the early 2000s. Since then, SWANA has been quietly (perhaps too quietly) going about its business. Anne Gribbons (now the Dressage Coach for the USA National Dressage Team) had a major role to play in the formation of SWANA. Here is her "official account" of the beginnings of SWANA. Sometime in the mid-1970s as a learning experience, I went along on an inspection tour of Swedish warmbloods, so called "remounts", which were young horses presented to the SWA. Breeding of warmbloods was still in its infancy in the US, but our experience in the US with Trakehners had me convinced that we needed to have inspection tours organised in this country to educate the breeders and to approve the breeding stock. I talked to the then president of the SWA, Bengt Blomquist, as well as a friend and much respected breeder in Sweden, Marianne Barkevall, about the possibility of organising such a trip. Mr Blomquist was enthusiastic and helpful from the beginning. Shortly afterwards, I became the representative for the SWA in the US and for six or seven years I acted as a liaison between Sweden and the people in the US who wanted information on Swedish warmbloods. Having witnessed the birth pangs of other breed organisations, including breakups which lead to special interest groups, where one breed-type could end up having as many as three breed associations, I wanted to delay the formation of an American Swedish Warmblood Association as long as possible to allow for peoples' mistakes. Well, in this regard it appears that I was successful because since 1994 we have stayed as one organisation. SWB Inspections start in North America.......With a lot of help from Sweden, I organised the first inspection tour for stallions and mares in 1981, when the judges were Eric Lette, Stig Holm and Kurt Graaf (DVM). Two years later the group of judges were Stig Holm, Kurt Graaf (DVM) and Lennart Ljungstorp, all well-respected horsemen and part of the inspection team in Sweden. The budget was meagre and the judges were often housed in homes or in less fashionable hotels in order to make ends meet. We moved the commission all over the country to accommodate the horse owners and the three men were all troopers about the inconvenient and hectic schedule. The inspection tour became a biennial event and among the first stallions to become approved were Chocolat 9001, Electus 9002, Eros II 9003, Garrant 9004, Marquis 9005, Three Crowns 9006 and Zorn 9007. Garrant had already been breeding for several years at his home at Seabreeze Farm in California, although often advertised as a "Swedish Trakehner". From this first crop of stallions, Garrant ridden Helen Polinitza, Three Crowns ridden by Anne Gribbons, and Zorn with Dennis Callin became successful FEI dressage competitors. Chocolat started a dressage career with his owner, Kit Young, but was sold and ended up the Champion Working hunter of the nation in one of his competition years. The first mare to receive a diploma was Garbo, an immigrant foal imported in utero by Flamingo out of Geigy, belonging to the Paulsens, now living in Washington State. Importations of Swedish Warmbloods Grow......Linda Zang put the Swedish horse on the American map with her Grand Prix mount, Fellow Traveller, by Drabant, whom she trained in Sweden under the watchful eye of Yngve Viebke and later brought back the States for a wonderful FEI career. Idlewilde, Zang's farm in Maryland, has been an inspection site for many years and was one of the favourite stops for the inspection commission. Linda has returned to Sweden enough times to bring around 150 Swedish warmbloods to this country since she started importing them in 1980. Dennis Callin has brought several Swedish horses to the FEI levels in addition to the stallion Zorn. He came very close to making the World Championship team in 1982 with Zenith, who ended up in the alternative team, and was still long-listed with that horse for the 1984 Olympics. Both Zorn and Zenith competed in Europe with Dennis on board. Gail Carmona became active in Swedish warmblood breeding after she and her husband Hector, visited Knoll Farm, owned by Anne and David Gribbons in NY, to watch the horses during the first stallion approvals. Hector Carmona decided they needed to go to Sweden to take a closer look at the Swedish horses in their natural habitat. Gail and Hector imported their first group of "Swedes" in 1983 and among them was L.A. Utrilla, who later on became one of the foundation mares of the breeding of Swedish Warmblood at Los Alamos Dressage Centre in NJ. This mare produced enough outstanding off-spring to earn her a Premium A status broodmare. One of her sons is the approved stallion L.A. Baltic Inspiration. L.A. Baltic Inspiration is the son of L.A. Baltic Sun, who was imported as a yearling colt by Gail and Hector. In 1987 Hector tragically did not live long enough to see L.A. Baltic Sun fly through the approvals at Knoll Farm later that year. The colt was approved with very good scores: a "9" for gaits and "8" for type. He reached Grand Prix dressage with Gail aboard and gathered many USDF awards along the way. He was victorious at Dressage at Devon both as a young horse, when he won the Championship, and as a mature horse by producing champions and more importantly, no less than three approved stallions and one diploma mare. In 1997, L.A. Baltic Sun became the first stallion ever approved in North America to be granted Premium A status by the Swedish Warmblood Association. The son of L.A. Baltic Sun, L.A. Baltic Inspiration, was born in 1991 and emerged as one of our top jumping stallions. Winning such events as the International Jumper Futurity in 1997 and placing first and second in his first Grand Prix Jumper stakes in 1998, ridden by Laura Chapot. In 1999, L.A. Baltic Inspiration won the Gambler's Choice at the Devon Horse Show, while making a successful debut at the Prix St. George Level of dressage with Gail Carmona riding. Gail and Hector Carmona took a chance on these horses ......and never looked back. Their loyalty to the cause and hard work has had some wonderful rewards and the reputation of the Swedish horse as and all round athlete has been greatly enhanced by their involvement with the Swedish horse. The stallion Amiral, who was used by NZ Breeders in the 1980s. Anne Hands Over The Reins........After the 1984 Olympics, I decided to devote more time to training, competing and judging dressage, so it was time to resign from my "post". On the recommendation of Jan Philipsson, Kristina Paulsen was asked to replace me and following is the continuation, as told by Kristina and her husband Norm. Being born in Sweden, Kristina knew the language and her husband, Norm, was pretty "Savvy" with a computer, which in itself became very valuable for the organisation as Norm created all the computer programs still being used today by the Swedish Warmblood Association of North America (SWANA). Kristina, at the time also living in California, already had a connection with Sweden through her SWB breeding programme. In 1979 the Paulsens imported their first Swedish horse, a gelding by Nepal 390 for Norm and the now "famous" broodmare, Geigy by Presto xx-Utrillo 432. At that time Geigy was pregnant with Flamingo 481 and produced the first "immigrant foal", Garbo, in 1980. Garbo became the first Diploma mare during the very first inspection held in 1983 and Geigy subsequently became the first Premium Elite mare in North America. Geigy belongs to a solid "dressage family" and was half sister (same dam) to the approved FEI dressage stallion, Juvel (Flamingo 481-Utrillo 432). SWB Breeding Grows in North America........Kristina soon realised what a big job she had inherited from Anne. In actuality, she was the "chief cook and bottle washer" and the kitchen table became too small with the Swedish horse business spreading out into other parts of the house. After a couple of years, it was suggested that SWA in Sweden be represented by a spokesperson in each of the time zones. Anita Estrand in the east, and Bo Crabo the mid-west, both Swedish by birth and active breeders, accepted those positions with Kristina remaining in charge of the main office on the West Coast. At that time, Kristina became the SWA's US representative and the owners/riders database had a little under 300 names at that time. But SWANA was slowly growing and subsequently entered the new millennium with a data base including about 2400 names and about 1800 listed horses. SWANA is born...........Jan Philipsson understood the importance of promoting the SWB horse in America according to the Swedish rules and really pushed for sending qualified inspectors over here. The second inspection in 1983 was partially paid by SWA and a large horse insurance company. The Swedish office hoped to help breeders in Sweden to sell good breeding stock, primarily mares, to North America, an idea that still, unfortunately, has not really taken off. Since there were so few SWB horses (in numbers, in a large country) in the beginning, biennial inspection tours were all that could be afforded, although they did finally pay for themselves. Any profit however was returned to the ASVH office in Sweden, although that office then had to spend money to help us again. Since this did not make sense, Bo Crabo subsequently petitioned SWA so that we should be allowed to form the non-profit organisation called Swedish Warmblood Association of North America (SWANA) and charge membership fees with the hope that we could become self supportive. In 1994, SWANA was formed and became a dues paying sub-organisation under the SWA umbrella.