The Name Blame : Tradition: The revival of the famed Camarillo White Horses and the use of the family moniker angers some relatives of the team’s former owners.
At the funeral mass for Carmen Camarillo Jones six years ago, a white stallion with an empty saddle stood sentry outside the entrance of the church.
To the members of the family that founded the city of Camarillo, the occasion was assumed to be the end of an era of public appearances for the celebrated matched team known as the Camarillo White Horses.
A few months later, Jones’ 11 white horses were sold at auction and Camarillo family members thought that was the last time that they would see the silvery animals together.
But the Camarillo White Horses suddenly reappeared on the parade circuit in 1988, one year after the auction. They have since been featured regularly in the city of Camarillo Christmas Parade, the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena and other events.
The new team features eight horses. At first, one mare in the group belonged to a great-nephew of Jones. But, since 1990, none of the horses being presented as Camarillo White Horses has actually been owned by a member of the Camarillo family.
Some Camarillo family members contend that the horse owners are violating the last wishes of Carmen Camarillo Jones.
“Her intent was that the tradition of the Camarillo family white horse parading would come to an end,” said Paquita Parker, 62, an Ojai resident and niece of the matriarch.
Gerald Fitzgerald, a nephew of Jones and executor of her estate, said his aunt directed in her will that the horses be sold upon her death. He said it was a tacit understanding that their parade appearances would end.
“I think she would have been alarmed and had a fit if she knew other people were going to be taking it over,” he said. “My aunt was a very proud woman.”
Fitzgerald and some other family members said they wouldn’t mind so much if the new owners would at least use another name.
“Leave the Camarillo name out of it,” Fitzgerald said. “It’s our family name.”
To the new owners, however, there is no other name for the elegant, swan-white creatures.
“They are the Camarillo horses,” said Ojai resident Priscilla Stuart-Galgas, who owns two of the animals. “How can I call them something they aren’t?”
It was Stuart-Galgas who organized the new parade unit after contacting six other owners of the current team of white horses, including some whose animals were never owned by Carmen Camarillo Jones, but are instead the offspring of her stock.
In addition to Stuart-Galgas, the other owners are Ojai residents Tanya Langkopf and Nadine Webb, and Camarillo residents Judy Aronson, Audra Seldeen and Martin and Jane Gish.
Stuart-Galgas said the Camarillo family lost exclusive rights to their ancestral name when their patriarch, Adolfo Camarillo--the father of Carmen--founded a town on his 10,000-acre ranch.
“Maybe Camarillo city bank or Camarillo plumbing or Camarillo used-car lot is taking their name too,” she said.
Although the white horses bred by the Camarillo family are about seven-eighths quarter horse and not a registered breed, they are a distinct enough group to keep their traditional name, Stuart-Galgas said.
The horses bred by the Camarillos have pink skin and dark eyes, which distinguishes them from albino horses and white Arabians, according to Parker.
Albino horses, which are white because they lack pigment, have pink skin and light eyes, while white Arabians have a grayish skin and dark eyes, Parker said.
Adolfo Camarillo started his line of horses with a stark-white stallion named Sultan that he purchased at the 1921 California State Fair in Sacramento.
After breeding the animals for their color, he began showing them in the 1930s, with his daughter Carmen continuing the tradition after his death in 1958.
Ridden by family members and friends wearing traditional Mexican-style costumes, the horses were paraded in events throughout the state, from the San Francisco California Centennial Parade in 1950 to the Hollywood Christmas Parade and Santa Barbara Fiesta Days.
The parading white horses began as a Camarillo family custom, but they evolved into a part of history, said Stuart-Galgas and other owners.
Indeed, an image of Adolfo Camarillo on a white stallion is the official city logo of Camarillo, appearing on street signs, city-owned vehicles and in City Hall.
“How are we supposed to obliterate history?” said Seldeen, 47, one of the horse owners.
“These horses were bred to be paraded,” said Langkopf, another owner. “The city of Camarillo greets us with the biggest smile” in the annual Christmas parade. “They love us.”
Langkopf and the other owners said they don’t benefit financially from parading the animals.
“We do it for sheer pleasure, joy and love of these horses,” she said. “We all feel the horses should be together.”
At least one member of the Camarillo family agrees: Steve Petit, a great-grandson of Adolfo, who purchased one horse at the auction that he later gave to Langkopf.
Petit said he initially intended the horse as a gift for his daughter and to preserve a piece of family history. But after Stuart-Galgas contacted him, he paraded the animal with the group for two years.
He gave the mare to Langkopf in 1990, when it became apparent that his daughter preferred MTV to horseback riding, he said.
Petit, who lives in San Juan Capistrano, said the family shouldn’t be sanctimonious about having their name used.
“We’re not the Pope or something,” he said.
He said Stuart-Galgas’ group has filled a void created upon Jones’ death because no Camarillo family member had stepped forward to take responsibility for keeping and parading the horses.
Fitzgerald said his aunt Carmen preferred to see the parading tradition end rather than to bequeath the horses to a family member who may not be willing or able to care for them properly.
“She was afraid they’d Mickey-Mouse it,” Fitzgerald said. “Maybe they’d keep them going and they wouldn’t keep them up.”
As for the current owners of the white horses, they said they plan to keep them up and going, hoping eventually to breed them.
“We’re not going to quit riding the horses and most likely we’re not going to quit calling them the Camarillo White Horses,” said Seldeen. “This will go on forever.”
