Mary's Story

By: Catherine French

Mary McLaughlin works for Jack Fisher. She has proven herself to be indispensable to his operation.. She took five horses down to Nashville for the Iroquois. One of which was Sonny and Ann Via's Good Night Shirt who won the Iroquois on Saturday. Mary loaded up the horses, Ben and Jerry (her dogs) on Sunday morning to head back to Maryland. I passed her on 1-40 about 9:30 that morning on my way home to Camden. We chatted on the phone for a few minutes and she pulled off to get a little gas. I continued on my way and arrived home around 4 o'clock Sunday afternoon. I called Mary to check on her and left her a message to call me when she arrived. Minutes later she rang to say that she was still in Tennessee. As she got back onto the interstate her oil pressure started dropping at which point she called Bryan Hogan who was on his way north as well. Bryan knows all there is to know about the running of vans and trucks and many of us have had him repair or tell us what the problem might bewith our vehicles. Mary is able to pull off the interstate before the truck stops. While she is waiting on the wrecker to arrive she gives her horses a dose of electrolytes and a little tranquilizer, not knowing what lies ahead. One of the horses has a bit of a bellyache and Mary calls Tara, who also once worked for Jack Fisher and whose significant other, Willie Dowling, rides Good Night Shirt. Tara gives Mary the name of a vet in the area, Dr. Maben Thompson, who comes out to treat the horse on the trailer. The wrecker tows the truck into the shop and the vet goes back home toget his truck to take the trailer and Mary back to his farm where the horses will stay until the truck is repaired and they can continue on their way. Mary spends the night in the LaQuinta just down the road from the vet's farm and the next morning his little son and daughter help Mary take the horses out for a graze. The truck is supposedly repaired late on Monday afternoon and Mary loads everything up in preparation to leave early on Tuesday morning. She gets about 60 miles down the road and the truck stops again, the same problem. With help from Michael Berryman, Anne Haynes and Will they come pick her up in the Haynes' truck and Mary's truck gets towed once again to a dealership. She meets Anne Haynes at the Bristol exit to drop Will off and they can't seem to get the lights working on the trailer. Anne goes into town to get an adapter in hopes that the lights will work. Everything seems to be fine until Mary gets on the highway and notices that she has no lights. Well, it's getting dark so she called Bryan Hogan (again) and he tells her that he will meet her at the junction of 66 and 81 but Mary knows that she can't make it that far with darkness fast approaching. Bryan tells her to pull into a truck stop and ask for some battery powered lights that will hook onto the back of the trailer. The guy in the shop says he doesn't have any and gives Mary a bit of lip. With this she walks out of the store and a man Eddie Mead approaches her to say that he had overheard the conversation and he can help her. The two of them walk across the road to another store where Eddie buys an electric light to the tune of 100.00. He runs an electrical line down the side of the trailer, hooks up the yellow flashing light on the back and Mary is back in business. Eddie gives Mary his card saying that he has a fleet of 40 or so trucks (Mead Transportation) on the road and should she ever have a problem to call him on his cell phone and he is sure that one of his drivers, who are all very reliable will be able to help her. Once again, Mary is on her way and my cell phone beeped at 4 am Wednesday morning. I jumped out of bed (well maybe not jumped more like stumbled) and there was a text from Mary saying that the horses were unloaded and she was home. To which I replied YIPPPPPPPEEEEEE! The vet wouldn't take her money and neither did the nice trucker who helped her with the battery operated lights. The Haynes family came to her rescue, turned over their truck to her to drive back to Maryland. The horses are fine and happy to be back home as is Mary. She will be heading out again this weekend to High Hope in the Haynes' truck. Michael Berryman will pick up Mary's truck and meet her at the races at which time they will swap vehicles. Hopefully her trip home will be a safe and uneventful one. There are a lot of really nice people in this world and how lucky was Mary to have met so many of them in the stretch of three days.