Horses Are at the Heart of Our History

May 6, 2026

As we observe Adopt a Horse Month throughout May, it’s an especially fitting time to reflect on the central role equines have played throughout the ASPCA’s history.

The moment that sparked our founding came when Henry Bergh witnessed the brutal beating of a carriage horse. That act of cruelty — and Bergh’s determination to stop it — was forever captured in the ASPCA seal. Cast in bronze, one is displayed at the ASPCA headquarters in Manhattan, another at Bergh’s grave and a third at the grave of an unlikely ally: Louis Bonard, a French fur trapper who feared he might be reincarnated as a carriage horse. Bonard left his considerable estate to the ASPCA and, like Bergh, was laid to rest in Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery.

During his 22-year tenure as president of the ASPCA, Bergh relentlessly challenged the overloading of horse-drawn streetcars. Though it was widely known that he had no pets, a New York Herald correspondent who once visited Bergh’s country estate reported that he kept horses. “Lean, rawboned beasts, exactly like the stage and car horses of New York City,” the writer observed, surprised by their condition. “Doubtless, Bergh bought them through pity.”

Innovations for Horses

Bergh showed unexpected aptitude for inventive thinking when it came to helping New York City’s working horses. In 1867 — one year after our founding, but two years before the city’s first ambulance for people was introduced by Bellevue Hospital — Bergh pioneered the world’s first ambulance for injured and sick horses.

In 1875, Bergh designed a canvas sling that could rescue horses trapped in mud, rivers or ditches. ASPCA Hospital veterinarians later adapted the design with a ceiling-mounted track that allowed them to move injured horses safely into position for treatment.

Across New York, ASPCA agents ensured working horses had fresh water, maintaining permanent and seasonal watering stations — up to 70 at their peak, primarily in Manhattan but also in the outer boroughs and Westchester. On sweltering days, lines of thirsty horses gathered at the fountains, a sight that Bergh said repaid him “for all the work I am doing on their behalf.”

Though most watering troughs disappeared by the mid-20th century, the ASPCA trucked water to carriage and other working horses during the summer. The ASPCA also tested novel ways to comfort working horses, like distributing patented bonnets outfitted with internal fan wheels to shield their eyes and keep them cool — small acts of compassion that could transform daily life for animals who powered the city.

Innovations for equines continued after Bergh’s death. In 1902, the ASPCA put a motorized horse ambulance into service, and in 1912, opened our first free veterinary facility, which served horses exclusively.

The Great Epizootic

In the fall of 1872, New York City ground to a halt when virtually every horse and mule fell ill with equine influenza that swept in from Toronto along rail lines and canal routes. This roughly year-long period came to be known as The Great Epizootic. With 20,000 animals down in Manhattan alone, roadways fell eerily silent. Streetcars halted, as did fire engines, ambulances, milk and ice delivery, garbage pickup — even funeral processions. The ASPCA, when possible, dispatched our horse ambulance to rush the worst cases to veterinary hospitals. Treatment was simple — mainly rest in open-air structures filled with straw — but the outbreak underscored Bergh’s long‑standing warning about overworked horses.

As the equine flu spread across the country, cities began turning to new technologies. Steam engines replaced horsepower in places like New Orleans, cable cars debuted in San Francisco, and by the late 1880s, electric streetcars were reshaping urban life.

Shaping Humane Change for Horses

As the 20th and 21st centuries unfolded, the ASPCA broadened our impact on horses, tackling systemic threats, shaping policy and championing long‑term change.

During World War I, the ASPCA lectured at military forts and camps on the care of horses in warfare and provided custom-made horse ambulances and emergency supplies — including Bergh’s sling — to the Allied veterinary corps in France, which managed 2.5 million horses and mules on the Western Front.
In March 1929, ASPCA agents inspected more than 22,000 horses in New York City, replacing improperly affixed bits — part of the bridle that fits inside a horse’s mouth — at no cost to horse owners.

In 1989, the ASPCA led efforts to regulate New York City’s carriage horse industry, including setting limits on working hours — though these rules expired in 1994. After a carriage horse named Ryder collapsed (and had to be euthanized) in 2022, renewed legislation — Ryder’s Law — sought to phase out horse‑drawn carriages, but the bill was defeated. Today, carriage horse operations are mainly confined to Central Park.

In 2007, ASPCA-supported legislation helped shut down the last three domestic horse slaughterhouses that were responsible for killing more than 104,000 horses in 2006 alone. But horse slaughter is not technically illegal on a permanent basis, and tens of thousands of American horses are still trucked to Canada or Mexico for slaughter every year. The Save America’s Forgotten Equines Act of 2025 would prohibit exporting horses for slaughter across our borders and would permanently ban the slaughter of horses for human consumption on U.S. soil, ensuring that horse slaughterhouses could never come back.
In 2019, the ASPCA convened a coalition to advance humane, sustainable management of wild horses and burros on federal lands. With the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (part of the Department of the Interior) estimating over 85,000 of these animals roaming free today, the ASPCA continues to urge Congress and the agency to ensure that funding and policies prioritize humane and non‑lethal population management.

Enduring Work for Horses

From the show ring to the rescue community, the ASPCA’s modern work champions and impacts horses in meaningful, measurable ways.

The annual ASPCA Maclay National Championship, held during the National Horse Show, was launched in 1933 by ASPCA board member and National Horse Show president Alfred B. Maclay to reward compassionate, kind riding. Competitors are judged on skill and precision, and for many, it’s a springboard to scholarships and lifelong careers; distinguished alumni include numerous Olympians. Widely regarded as the highest honor in equitation, the Maclay is hosted in Tryon, North Carolina.

In 2019, the ASPCA acquired the Right Horse Initiative, a program that elevates and advances the work of equine-adoption organizations and supporters nationwide. As a result, more donkeys, ponies and mules have found homes, allowing the rescue community to help more at-risk equines. We have provided approximately $1 million in grant funding to ASPCA Right Horse partners and routinely transport adopted horses from our partners to new homes via our Horse Adoption Express program. In 2025, more than 3 million people visited myrighthorse.org, the ASPCA’s online adoption platform for equines, comprised of more than 100 adoption and industry partner groups.
Since opening in Oklahoma in 2021, the ASPCA’s Equine Transition and Adoption Center has been a vital lifeline for horses across the state — and is on the cusp of an exciting milestone: impacting 1,000 horses through adoption and services. In 2025, the Center placed 22 horses into adoptive homes, provided 20 behavioral interventions and offered safety net services to 94 equines.

For 160 years, the ASPCA’s commitment to equines has endured — a legacy still unfolding and carried forward in every horse we helped.