The Famous Anheuser Busch Clydesdales Will Be In El Paso

11-26-08 (Wed.) – Stable viewing (all day, Johnny Bean Farms, 6201 S. Strahan, Canutillo, TX.)

11-27-08 (Thurs.) – 72nd Annual Sun Bowl Thanksgiving Parade ( parade starts @ 10:00 a.m.)

11-28-08 (Fri.) – Town of Socorro (Socorro Mission – 328 Nevarez Rd., @ 12:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.)

11-29-08 (Sat.) – Ft. Bliss, TX. (Class 6 @ 12:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.)

It was in 1933, shortly after the signing of the Cullen-Harrison Act – effectively ending national Prohibition for beer – when the Budweiser Clydesdales became a part of Anheuser-Busch. August A. Busch Jr. and Adolphus Busch III decided to present a hitch of the mighty horses to their father to commemorate the first bottle of post-Prohibition beer brewed in St. Louis.Mr. Busch told his father that he had bought a new car and asked him to step outside and take a look at the new vehicle. But instead of a Model “T,” Mr. Busch’s father gazed upon a Clydesdale hitch pulling a red, white and gold beer wagon.

Realizing the advertising and promotional potential of a horse-drawn beer wagon, Mr. Busch had a second team sent by rail to New York City, where it picked up a case of Budweiser beer at New Jersey’s Newark Airport. The beer was later presented to Al Smith, former governor of New York and an instrumental force in the repeal of Prohibition. From there, the Clydesdales continued on a tour of New England and the Middle Atlantic States. The hitch even delivered a case of beer to President Franklin D. Roosevelt at The White House.

During the initial years on the road, the Clydesdales were transported by train. Before truck transport was introduced in 1940, the horses, wagons and harness equipment had to be unloaded from the trains, put on local trucks and then unloaded wherever the horses were stabled.

Now, the horses travel in style aboard custom-designed tractor-trailers, and their travels take them throughout North America and occasionally overseas. The Clydesdales travel to hundreds of appearances each year to meet cheering crowds and happy faces. Whether they’re seen at a parade in Iowa or a rodeo in Texas, the Clydesdales are always a crowd pleaser. The Clydesdale hitches travel some 100,000 miles a year in all, and with each mile they cover, so continues the Budweiser tradition.