Pretty soon I'm scouting around for a parking space in a 15-acre field literally overflowing with what appear to be every known model of four-wheel drive vehicles, and I begin to get the drift.
On Friday nights in Thurmont, all roads lead to Eyler's. It has been this way since 1933, when Harry Eyler, grandfather of the present-day proprietor Albert Eyler, built the auction barn that houses Maryland's oldest, and largest, horse auctioneering firm.
"People come here for different reasons," says Jesse Austin, a horse dealer from Louisa, Va., who is among the most active buyers at Thurmont, purchasing hundreds of horses there in the course of a single year. "Some people are lookin' to buy a horse, others are selling, but a lot of them are just having a Friday night outing."
Horses of all descriptions, from toddler-sized ponies to Clydesdales (as well as an occasional llama or burro), pass through the auction aisle on the first and third Friday evenings of every month; on alternate weeks, the sale menu consists exclusively of tack and trailers. A sale of tack, and other assorted items, also warms up the crowd on horse auction nights; the actual horse sale gets underway at 8:30 p.m., or thereabouts, and usually lasts till around midnight.
The auction serves a wide market, many people routinely traveling here from as far away as upstate New York and South Carolina. But Eyler's is, in some ways, a throwback to another era, when livestock markets dotted the landscape, beckoning like local shopping malls to farmers and their families. You can buy a cowboy hat or a bottle of liniment or browse through jewelry at one of several concession booths set up outside, while waiting for your horse to come up for sale. Your kids are free to organize a softball game, if the action indoors fails to entertain them. Or the whole family might dine on beef barbecue and hot dogs, cooked behind the counter in a food-service area that has probably served more customers, all told, than the local McDonald's.
Most people sit on the facing bleachers just inside the main doorway, or stand two-deep along the aisle leading to the auctioneer's stand. From there, they get a close-up view of the main attraction: a steady parade of horses - whatever their fancy, it could be next - up for bids. Many of the horses perform before the crowd, ridden either by their owners or professional riders who are regulars at the Elyer sales. Some of them canter with surprising speed down the sawdust-covered center aisle, and many display their talents by jumping a post held up by men on either side. If all goes well, the height of the jump is raised the next time through. And if the horse has trouble slowing down soon enough, and bumps into a few spectators at the end of the aisle, nobody is concerned: "a high-energy horse," praises the auctioneer.
The scene gets played over and over, sometimes word for word.
"The people change, and the horses change," reflects Judy Hahn, of Highland, Md., who has been selling horses at Thurmont for some 30 years. "But somehow this place manages to stay exactly the same."
Continuity is exactly what Albert Eyler, 45, aims to provide. Like many of of his customers, he has been coming here all his life; somewhere along the way, buying and selling horses became Eyler's life.
It was Albert's father, Joe Eyler, and mother Ruth Eyler who converted the family auction business from a general livestock sale to one specializing in horses. That transition, coming when they took over in 1944, happened naturally enough since both Joe and Ruth Eyler were horsepeople - actually household names in the world of Standardbred racing around that time. Joe achieved prominence as an owner and trainer, and Ruth as an amateur driver on the county fair circuit. Mrs. Eyler was, in fact, the first woman to drive a winner under harness racing rules in Maryland.
Meanwhile Albert, whose first job was riding ponies in the sales ring, learned the auction trade from the ground up. He purchased the business at a public auction following his parents' divorce in 1982. His father died six years later, but his mother, now 81, still sits up in the auctioneer's stand on Friday nights, clerking the sales, as she has for decades. "It's the way I keep up with my old friends," says the steely gray-haired lady.
Carrying on into the fourth generation is Arianne (Niki) Eyler, who frequently helps out at the sales. A senior at nearby Mount St. Mary's College, Niki, 24, is the daughter of Albert and his wife Jody, who also has a key role in the family operation, as the office administrator.
Two auctioneers, Donnie Gochenour and John Flaugher, a full-time maintenance supervisor, Tom Green, and seven other sales-night employees make up the rest of the auction staff.
In the course of a year Eyler's crew will handle the transfer of more than 2,200 horses. "Last year we held 34 sales (including regular Friday night auctions, special sales usually consisting of dispersals, and the traditional, all-day New Year's Day sale, which is always the largest offering of the year). We usually sell about 65 head of horses at each sale, so the numbers really do add up," says Albert Eyler.
Most of the horses sell in the $1,000-2,000 range. The all-time Eyler auction record was set in May, 1993, by the Thoroughbred mare Countess Brook (a daughter of Count Brook), who sold along with the Art Deco foal at her side for $9,100. "This is the kind of place where people can come to buy an animal of quality, take him home, improve him, and sell him for a good profit," says Eyler.
Dealers were reluctant to talk, on the record, about specific success stories, so as not to launch bidding wars on their future prospects. But the 1992 national green pony champion Trend Setter reportedly passed through Thurmont on his way to fame and fortune, and word has it that a grand prix jumper bought at the Eyler auction for $2,200 was resold several years later for $250,000.
Occassionally, more exotic types of hoofed animals such as llamas, can be found at Eyler's auction. People have fun looking at them, but those interested in buying are few and far between. So Albert Eyler generally encourages would-be consignors of exotic animals to find another approach. "There's no market for them here," he says. "You could haul all the exotics animals I've sold over the years away in one pickup truck."
Although horsemen everywhere dream of catching lightning in a bottle, few come to Eyler's in hopes of finding a world-beater. For some buyers, such as Garnet Payne, an 80-year old farmer from Charles Town, W.Va., it is more like an ongoing contest of horsemanship and wits. "I grew up around horses, and I have them in my blood," says Payne, who has been buying and reselling Eyler auction horses for 30 years. "I'd match my ability to spot a bargain against anybody's. Of course, you don't really know what you're getting - that's part of what makes it interesting."
Mystery does, indeed, shroud the background of many of the horses sold at Eylers. Most horses are brought to the grounds at least several hours before the sales, which is when the real work begins for dealers such as Jesse Austin. Few details escape the horseman's practiced eye. What is he looking for? "Soundness," Austin replies. "I look at a horse's eyes, wind, legs. Kindness is also important."
There are no catalogs at an Eyler auction (except for some special sales), and a horse may be consigned only minutes before going through the ring. Each of these factors contributes a great deal to the overall informality of the marketplace.
When a horse is about to go under the auctioneer's gavel, his seller is urged to stand up and talk about his fine qualities. Rising to the occasion, a woman was nearly drowned out by whinnies as she described her 9-year-old Thoroughbred crossbred mare. "Not for beginners...jumps four feet eight inches," the owner related. "Worst problem is, once in awhile she won't tie."
"Hell, I won't do that!" responded a man on the other side of the crowded bleachers.
Horses presented as sound may be returned up to three days following the sale, according to Eyler. "We get back maybe six horses a year," he says. "They offer a kind of guarantee that you won't find anywhere else," says John Hughes, a perennial buyer from Boyce, Va.
Reserve prices are set on about 90 percent of the horses consigned to the sale, relates Eyler; according to him, fewer than 10 percent of the horses fail to meet their reserve at any given sale. RNA's are announced as "no sale."
For its services, the auction company receives a 10 percent commission on the first $1,000, and 6 percent of anything over that amount. Eyler also buys and sells horses and ponies on a daily basis, from his office in the sales barn.
But on this mild spring evening, with the witching hour drawing closer, all that really matters is what's going on right this minute. The auctioneer's chant wafts through the darkness like a far-off drumbeat: "...extremely easy keeper, loves to travel," the announcer breaks in, describing a sorrel Quarter Horse gelding with a flowing mane and tail.
