WishfulThinker
Well-Known Member
One of the local celebrity horses in my area was put to sleep yesterday. He was well known in my youth and he lived just up the road from my parents and started my love for horses and heavy horses.
RIP Boris: gentle giant, TV and film star who made sick children smile
clydesdale regularly visited youngsters in hospital and paved way for emmerdale extravaganza
By Morag Lindsay
Published: 22/04/2008
ONE MAN AND HIS HORSE: George Walker with Boris in the Clydesdale horses sunset years at his home near Inverurie. Colin Rennie
More Pictures
A gentle giant who put a smile on the faces of countless sick children and kick-started a £2million fundraising phenomenon has died at home in Aberdeenshire.
Boris the Clydesdale was put to sleep yesterday at Hillside Stables, near Inverurie, where he had enjoyed a long and eventful life with owners George and Jenny Walker.
Aged 24, he lived to twice the age of most Clydesdales and battled back from a horrific accident in 1999.
In his heyday, Boris appeared in Mel Gibsons film version of Hamlet, the television soap Emmerdale and a series of childrens books.
He performed at public events, posing happily beside pipes and drums, ceilidh bands and exploding cannons and paid regular visits to the childrens hospital in Aberdeen.
During one visit he met Stonehaven teenager Kevin Humphreys, whose death from leukaemia on Christmas Day 2001 led Mr Walker to organise the first wing-walk in his name and begin a long association with the Anthony Nolan Trust.
When Emmerdale actor and horse-lover Chris Chittell was persuaded to attend the launch of one of the Boris books in aid of the charity he was so charmed with the big horse that he offered to do more to help.
That meeting sowed the seeds for the annual Emmerdale Extravaganza, which raised more than £2million for a range of charities during the seven years it was staged in the north-east.
The low point for Boris came when he was struck by a car near Westhill in Aberdeenshire while towing a wedding carriage.
The bride, her father and Mr Walker were hurt.
Boris suffered spinal injuries and lost his confidence in crowds and strange situations.
Mr Walker believes Boris saved the lives of those in the carriage that day by lying on the road until his wife freed him from the harness when most horses would have got up and bolted.
His twilight years were spent in well-earned retirement at the Walkers home, where he loved to welcome visitors, particularly the couples toddler son, Georgie, and other children.
Mr Walker said it was a sad day at the stables yesterday.
I always said he was my biggest and best friend who had unconditional love for everyone, he said.
He was responsible for so much including the start of the Emmerdale Extravaganza.
I think, more importantly, he was responsible for putting smiles on childrens faces on his regular visits to the sick childrens hospital.
Boris liked nothing more than scratching against a tree and the family are going to plant one in his memory sited at an angle to remind them of how he left many a tree over the years.
RIP Boris: gentle giant, TV and film star who made sick children smile
clydesdale regularly visited youngsters in hospital and paved way for emmerdale extravaganza
By Morag Lindsay
Published: 22/04/2008
ONE MAN AND HIS HORSE: George Walker with Boris in the Clydesdale horses sunset years at his home near Inverurie. Colin Rennie
More Pictures
A gentle giant who put a smile on the faces of countless sick children and kick-started a £2million fundraising phenomenon has died at home in Aberdeenshire.
Boris the Clydesdale was put to sleep yesterday at Hillside Stables, near Inverurie, where he had enjoyed a long and eventful life with owners George and Jenny Walker.
Aged 24, he lived to twice the age of most Clydesdales and battled back from a horrific accident in 1999.
In his heyday, Boris appeared in Mel Gibsons film version of Hamlet, the television soap Emmerdale and a series of childrens books.
He performed at public events, posing happily beside pipes and drums, ceilidh bands and exploding cannons and paid regular visits to the childrens hospital in Aberdeen.
During one visit he met Stonehaven teenager Kevin Humphreys, whose death from leukaemia on Christmas Day 2001 led Mr Walker to organise the first wing-walk in his name and begin a long association with the Anthony Nolan Trust.
When Emmerdale actor and horse-lover Chris Chittell was persuaded to attend the launch of one of the Boris books in aid of the charity he was so charmed with the big horse that he offered to do more to help.
That meeting sowed the seeds for the annual Emmerdale Extravaganza, which raised more than £2million for a range of charities during the seven years it was staged in the north-east.
The low point for Boris came when he was struck by a car near Westhill in Aberdeenshire while towing a wedding carriage.
The bride, her father and Mr Walker were hurt.
Boris suffered spinal injuries and lost his confidence in crowds and strange situations.
Mr Walker believes Boris saved the lives of those in the carriage that day by lying on the road until his wife freed him from the harness when most horses would have got up and bolted.
His twilight years were spent in well-earned retirement at the Walkers home, where he loved to welcome visitors, particularly the couples toddler son, Georgie, and other children.
Mr Walker said it was a sad day at the stables yesterday.
I always said he was my biggest and best friend who had unconditional love for everyone, he said.
He was responsible for so much including the start of the Emmerdale Extravaganza.
I think, more importantly, he was responsible for putting smiles on childrens faces on his regular visits to the sick childrens hospital.
Boris liked nothing more than scratching against a tree and the family are going to plant one in his memory sited at an angle to remind them of how he left many a tree over the years.
