ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the Chincoteague Pony breed as a cultural product of Marguerite Henry’s Misty novels. In the case of the Chincoteague Pony, I suggest, a mythology of breed crystallizes local history and lore, nostalgia, and the economy of Chincoteague in a version of “horse” that manages human fantasy, conflict, and ambivalence about the wild. What results is a romanticized view of the “wild” horse as something accessible to – even organized around – particular kinds of human attachment and identity.
