About

etty-Lynn, was born and raised in the Edmonton area. She married Jim Tattersall in 1964 and
moved to the family ranch near Wainwright. While there Betty-Lynn purchased her first Arabian horse, a beautiful bay stallion.

In 1967 the family moved to the Ardrossan area. The Aurora Arabian Horse Association was a new organization at that time. At the Spring Aurora Show Betty-Lynn saw her first side saddle class and knew it was something she wanted to do.

She borrowed a saddle and began to compete. Of course, Betty-Lynn loved it immediately, and thus the passion for side saddle was born. She then proceeded to research saddles and costumes, and went on to compete successfully on the Arabian show circuit. In addition to side saddle classes, Betty-Lynn also competed successfully in English Pleasure, Western Pleasure, Two-Way Versatility, Reining and Trail classes in open shows, and rode all classes aside! Having a horse trainer husband also helped.

Over the years Betty-Lynn has been featured in side saddle articles in the Western Horsemen, The Western Horse, Country Woman, and Western People magazines.

Betty-Lynn began making show clothes for husband, Jim and herself. She gradually started making show clothes for others and thus started her little home business. During that time Betty-Lynn began to teach side saddle riding. She gave lessons and clinics to those wanting to learn this unique style of riding. It was while she was conducting the clinics that she started to purchase a few antique side saddles to use during the clinics. This lead to another passion --- collecting side saddles! As the collection

"In the early west, a horse was often a women's only means of transportation. That's how she visited her neighbors. Side saddles are as much a part of our western heritage as the stock saddle and should be accepted as such."

Quotation from Betty-Lynn that appeared in one of the articles written about her.

grew, it became apparent that the antique saddles were just not fitting our modern horses and riders the way they should.

Betty-Lynn had restored several of her antique saddles and felt confident that she could build a new saddle if she could obtain the saddle trees. About seven years ago Betty-Lynn approached the well-known saddle maker,
Roy McCaughey. He ordered a saddle tree, provided Betty-Lynn with some pointers, and she went to work creating custom-made side saddles.

Please visit the Side Saddle, Miscellaneous Tack, and Show Clothing pages via the above links to view samples of Betty-Lynn's creations.

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