Rachel Rivers Coffey

A Horse Like Mr Ragman

Scribner, New York, 1977, 149 pp.

Scholastic, paperback, 1980

“Twelve-year-old Elizabeth dreams of owning a tall and shiny Thoroughbred jumper, like Eva, the rich girl who keeps
her horse at the stable that Elizabeth rides at. But when her father finally breaks down and buys her a horse, it is a
shaggy pinto, and Elizabeth is embarrassed to show him, until his talents are discovered.”

Rachel Rivers Coffey was a newspaperwoman and writer.  Her father, R C Rivers, owned the Watauga Democrat, a weekly newspaper located in Boone, and Watauga County’s oldest business.  Rachel Rivers Coffey and her husband eventually took over the paper.  She and her husband were great benefactors:  they donated Rivers Park to the community:  an area of woodland containing the state’s largest Maple Tree.  The family also supported various educational programmes.  After Rachel Rivers Coffey died, the family started the Rivers-Coffey Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing at the Appalachian State University which “annually sponsors the residency of a writer of national prominence at Appalachian State University”.  

Rachel Rivers Coffey wrote one horse book:  her heroine Elizabeth has the classic horsy girl’s longing for a wonderful, competition winning horse, but when she achieves her dream and gets a horse, what turns up isn’t quite what she dreamed of.

Many thanks to Lisa Catz the photograph and summary.

Finding the book:  the book is easy to find in the USA.  It was not published in the UK.

Sources and links:

North Carolina newspapers

The Watauga Democrat

Bibliography - horse books only