Gallop Poll: A Brief History of Politicians Falling Off Horses

Gov. Terry McAuliffe is in good company.

T.W. Ingersoll/Library of Congress

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


The neighs have it.

Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-Va.) is recovering nicely after falling off a horse while on vacation in Tanzania in December. The Clinton confidante broke seven ribs in the fall and underwent an operation on Monday to drain fluid from his chest. Fortunately for McAuliffe, he’s in good company—politicians have had trouble holding onto their horses since at least the time of Herodotus. A brief history:

2014: At a holiday parade in Tulsa, Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) loses control of his horse, Speck, and crashes into a parked minivan with “Merry Christmas” written on the side.

2014: Dressed in colonial garb for a tourism video, Geelong, Australia mayor Darryn Lyons falls off his horse. His peroxide mohawk is unharmed.

2013: Turkmenistan president Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov (pronounced just like it’s spelled) shuts down his nation’s internet after a viral YouTube video circulates showing him falling off his horse during a race.

2011: Former Alabama supreme court chief justice Roy Moore breaks several bones after falling off his horse. Moore recovers and triumphantly rides his horse to the polls the next year to vote for himself.

2010: Gov. Jim Gibbons (R-Nev.) needs two ten-inch bolts to repair a broken pelvis after falling from his horse at a ranch.

2004: Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.) falls off a horse during a congressional delegation to Kazakhstan after downing six shots of vodka. Montana Democrats circulate an unsubstantiated rumor that Rehberg consumed a total of 20 shots of vodka and serenaded his hosts by chanting “meep meep” like a Conehead.

2003: Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan falls off an Arabian horse at an Istanbul park, after two previous attempts to hop on were unsuccessful. “The important point is to be able to stand up after falling down,” he says.

1908: President Theodore Roosevelt, a noted outdoorsman, is thrown off his mount while fording Washington, DC’s Rock Creek. He falls 10 feet but lands beside the horse, escaping further injury.

1847: Future president Franklin Pierce is thrown from his horse during battle outside Mexico City. Pierce’s leg is crushed after his horse falls on him, and he passes out, for which his subordinates derisively nickname him “Fainting Frank.”

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate