When people rode.

 Charleston, South Carolina, in 1909.  My grandfather, from St. Lambert Quebec, was living in Charleston at the time my grandmother wrote the lines below.

One of my cousins has been transcribing some of my grandparents old correspondence and sharing it with us, a real treat.  These date from the early part of 1917.

In some recent letters between them prior to their being married, this showed up, in correspondence from my grandmother to my grandfather:

I am glad you are beginning to get a little more settled in your position. I think it must be nice travelling through the mountains and then, if you get a horse, to go horse back riding on your tours, you will like it ever so much better. You will be getting to be a regular cow-boy.        

 And:

This noon, I received your further letter of the 17^th, and do hope that matters will be so arranged so that you will not be overworked. Can you not get a horse and go horseback riding instead of all that walking? You certainly must have done an awful lot to have so strained yourself, after all the walking we have done together.

And

This morning, I almost got run over by a runaway horse. Anyhow, my guardian angel was looking after me, I guess. Just as I came along Laurier, near Hutchison, I went to cross the street, when a baker’s wagon came tearing around the corner of Hutchison to go up Laurier, when the wagon swerved around, caught in the track, and upset, throwing the driver on his head on the track. The horse then frightened, and started to run away. It seemed to be blind and ran straight into a chinaman’s shop, on the other side of the street. It just missed a grocery store with big plate glass windows. I think the driver was hurt alright.

 And

I had a good laugh over your description of your horseback riding and the tendency the horse had for going to the dangerous spots.

And

I received your very interesting letter of the 3^rd this morning. It certainly must have been lovely riding through those mountains. It is too bad you had to do so much from the beginning instead of going gradually. But then as you say, it is up to Mr. (?) otherwise it would be just lovely. I just love horseback riding and then through such beautiful country.

My grandfather was working in Charleston, South Carolina at the time, and my grandmother, his fiance, was living in Quebec. I've never thought of that grandfather as being somebody who rode, but based on the letter, and my grandmother's causal reference to it, I suspect that my thought on that was wrong.