Ellington

Ginger and Burton Brown will open up their therapeutic horseback riding facility, Eagles Rest Ranch, Saturday, Oct. 30 for a joint Catoosa and Walker counties Equestrian Special Olympics.

“When you see these kids you will not walk away the same person,” Ginger Brown said. “It’s like a little Disney World here, and Mickey and Minnie are the horses and the kids are Cinderella.”

Just over 40 children with physical and mental disabilities will ride in four classes, navigated by 40 coaches and volunteers. They’ve been practicing for 10 weeks.

While training, children with scoliosis and cerebral palsy have stretched and strengthened their muscles, autistic children have said their first words and children in wheelchairs get to see what it’s like when people have to look up to them.

“When they’re on a horse, everybody’s looking up,” Brown said. “That has to subconsciously impact them.”

Ginger Brown said no child pays to participate in the Special Olympics. Generous donors have given money to buy special quick-release stirrups and she has set her sights next on special saddles for wheelchair riders.

This is the second year the Browns have offered the ranch for the event.

“I saw the potential,” Ginger Brown said, after last year drew only 10 riders.

She and her husband converted their 400-acre ranch into a therapeutic-focused facility about a year and a half ago. The idea began to take root eight years ago when a child with autism showed up for one of Brown’s regular camps.

“That was just trial and error and the good Lord guiding us,” she said.

Eagles Rest Ranch, licensed through SpiritHorse in Texas, focuses on private lessons, though Special Olympics training is done in groups.

Therapeutic riding is for people with mental and physical developmental disabilities as well as people with behavioral and psychological disabilities.

“These children learn to communicate with a horse and not throw a fit, because that gets them nowhere,” Brown said. “That’s a lesson. It’s awesome to see kids work through this.”

The Browns also raise bison, which they sell to local restaurants, and longhorn cattle, which began as kudzu control. Ginger Brown’s Academy of Performing Arts in Ringgold also offers rhythmic gymnastics classes for kids with disabilities.