John Fahey was born in Taree, New South Wales, and grew up on his family’s dairy farm at Upper Lansdowne. Horses were part of everyday life from the start.

“There was a number of children used to ride horses to school,” John said. “I remember about six horses in the paddock. That was how we got to school.”

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John said he enjoyed school, and he remembers being very small at the time, sometimes needing help just to get ready.

“I was very short and I had a pony and I was that little, I couldn’t put the saddle on,” he said. “So you used to have to con the teacher to put the saddle on sometimes. Otherwise I’d be riding bareback.”

At 14, John left school to work on the dairy farm with his father, Tom Fahey. He went to the headmaster and asked to leave.

“I went to the headmaster and said, ‘I want to leave school,’ and I was only 14,” John said. “He said, ‘What are you going to do?’ I said, ‘I suppose riding horses.’ He said, ‘Yes. Well, you can leave on one condition. If you break your leg in 12 months, you’ve got to come back to school.’ I said, ‘I’ll take that opportunity and I’ll leave now.’”

“I started traveling the shows… and just sort of made a career out of shows and riding horses,” he said.

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In those early years, the look of showjumping was different. John recalled that they rode in jockey racing colours that identified them, and he remembers the colours he wore.“All the big teams that traveled had their own colors,” he said. “You knew which team was by their colors… pale blue with a red sash.”

He also spoke about the equipment used at the time, including riding in an exercise saddle before showjumping saddles became more common.

“When I started it was… the exercise saddle,” John said. “Then the showjumping saddles come in… the Steindl Saddle… made in Bundaberg… one of the first good Australian saddles that were made.”

An early horse John spoke about was Valentine, which he described as an all-round horse with a wide list of wins.

“I used to ride Valentine,” John said. “At Sydney Royal Show, he won just about everything there. He won a pony hunt, a showjumping event. He won station pony 11 years running… he won polocrosse pony reserve… champion pony… he won the campdraft four years… and he was never, ever beaten in a flag race or a barrel race.”

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John also spoke about Kevin Bacon, and how closely he watched him when he was young.“When I was young… I never took my eyes off him,” John said. “He just had a brilliant eye… and he could get the best out of any horse.”

Bonvale came into John’s life because a friend of Tom Fahey owned the horse. After that man passed away, Tom had first offer to buy him.“Dad bought him for 550 pounds,” John said, “and that was a lot of money back then.”

John said the first major show he remembers with Bonvale was Taree Show, when he was 15.“I put him in the high jump and… we jumped seven foot two and won the high jump,” John said. “So that was the start of Bonvale’s career.”

Bonvale also had a reputation for jumping out. “You couldn’t keep him in a yard,” John said. “He’d just jump out anywhere.”

He gave an example from a training session in Canberra, where Bonvale jumped out, cleared fences, and ended up in a large paddock. John said he expected the horse to come back at feed time. “He was back at five o’clock feed time,” John said.

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In 1964, John said Sydney Royal hosted an Olympic selection event, and he was 20 at the time. He said he won his first Australian titles there, and that result qualified him for Tokyo.

“That show was where I won my first Australian titles, and that was my qualification to go to Tokyo,” he said.

John said it did not fully sink in immediately that he would be going overseas, partly because he had never been out of Australia before. “Not really… not until… we got into the school and started training,” he said. “It was a big thing because I had never been out of Australia before.”

He said training was based at Bowral, where Franz Mairinger and Karl Jurinak were based, and that the team trained together there and competed in a few shows before leaving.

John also recalled a farewell at Upper Lansdowne. “It was such a big party,” he said. “I think the hall was full… about 400 people there.”

The team travelled to Tokyo by ship, the SS Eastern Queen, with stables on the top deck. John said they lunged the horses twice a day. “We had the stables on the top deck,” he said. “We used to lunge our horses twice a day.”

He said it took about ten days to travel from Brisbane to Tokyo. Arriving in Japan was overwhelming. “When you’ve seen all the other top riders from Europe riding and… we were just bushies from Australia,” he said. “It was very overwhelming.”

John said the Tokyo venue had strong facilities.“It had an indoor arena and outdoor arena, one grass arena and one sand arena,” he said. “The facilities were fantastic.”

Above: Australia’s Jumping team in Tokyo: Bud Hyem, Barry Roycroft, Kevin Bacon, and John Fahey.

John also recalled that the jumping competition was held in the main stadium and “The ground was very wet… the ground was quite heavy,” he said. “It took a fair bit out of the horses to jump the two rounds.”

John said he finished fourth, and he described an incident involving a saddle cloth at the water jump.

“When I got to the water jump… the saddle cloth slipped back and dropped on Bonvale’s tail and he landed in the water,” he said, and then had the next fence down. He also said that without that incident he believes he would have finished on a score that could have placed him in silver medal position.“If I hadn’t had the water the first round… got the silver medal,” he said. “Bit of bad luck there.”

After Tokyo, John went on to England. He described part of the sea travel as rough, and he also recalled arriving in London and the method used to unload the horses.

“They never had a proper horse crate to unload the horses,” he said. “They used to unload elephants… the wind was blowing… every horse… fell over… It was one of the scariest moments in my life.”

He said he stayed near Gloucester, and remembered riding in snow during winter. “I can remember riding Bonvale through about four foot of snow,” he said. He also described working near Bill Roycroft and learning about fitness work through trotting.

“I learned that trotting was the best exercise for horses,” John said.

At Hickstead, John recalled winning across the first three days of the Easter meeting and placing on the next two days.“I won the first three days and placed the next two days,” he said.

John also spoke about Nations Cup performances at White City and Dublin, naming Bill Roycroft, Barry Roycroft and Peter Winton as teammates.

“We ran third at White City,” he said. “When we went to Dublin, we ran third again.”

Looking back across his later career, John also mentioned his World Cup record in broad terms, including being presented with a medal for 100 World Cup rides, as well as competing at World Cup Finals with horses including The Fall, Style, Barberino and Sorento.

He said Volvo sponsored five cars during a period, and he won three of them.

“I think I won three and I think Vicki Roycroft won the other two,” John said. “I kept the last one and I gave that to my mother and father.”

When asked what he was proud of, John described setting a goal early to represent Australia and working hard to achieve it.

“When I first started off… it was my goal,” he said. “I said, ‘I wanna represent Australia.’ Well, I made that happen… You don’t make goals and set them if you don’t put the hard yards in.”

The full interview is on the “All Clear’ Podcast. Available now on:

YouTube: https://bit.ly/4al1FL9

Spotify: https://bit.ly/3MH1pNn

Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3Ok6yeL

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