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“I understand he was afraid of horses, too.”

No. Asked in an interview if he rode horses for pleasure, he scowled and replied, ‘When I ride a horse, I want to be PAID’...still:

The Duke’s horse keeps special bond

Published in the Herald News 03/13/05

(This column, by John Whiteside, originally appeared on Jan. 16, 1985.)

Dollor’s ears twitch and then get alert when he hears that well-known voice. The horse looks around searching for the man behind that voice. He is looking for an old friend.

The 17-year-old chestnut gelding carried that man with that well-known voice on his back for many years. They were movie stars together.

Dollor, a long-legged quarter horse, made his movie debut in one of John Wayne’s finest scenes in one of the Duke’s best ever movies, “True Grit.”

Most John Wayne fans remember that scene at the very end. Rooster Cogburn’s other horse, Bo, had been killed when the old, fat, one-eyed marshal charged across the valley at four bad guys. Rooster got them, but they got Bo.

In the final scene, Rooster has found a new horse. Kim Darby’s character comments about the new horse. The marshal says that new horse can jump a four-rail fence.

And then with a sweep of his hat, John Wayne jumps his horse across the fence and the film ends with the horse and rider still in the air.

That was Dollor carrying the Duke, said Debra Keffeler of Midlothian, Texas. She’s now the proud owner of Dollor.

She said John Wayne first rode the horse in that move when Dollor was just a 2-year-old. The horse then was owned by a California movie production company that furnished horses for John Wayne movies.

“The Duke had an exclusive contract with them that no one could ride Dollor but him,” she said. “I think he liked the horse because their temperaments were a lot alike.”

“True Grit” was made in 1969. John Wayne made nine more Western movies after that, including “Chisum,” “Big Jake,” “The Cowboys,” “The Train Robbers” and “Rooster Cogburn.”

Dollor was in most of those films. He was mentioned specifically by name several times in the Duke’s last movie, “The Shootist.”

Debra said the Duke had “The Shootist” script rewritten so he could use Dollor’s name. That’s how much he thought of the horse.

She bought Dollor — “for a whole bunch of money” — about a year ago from an Iowa man. Dollor lives in a $65,000 barn with her nine other horses.

He’s in semi-retirement, content to munch on alfalfa hay and oats. But he still likes to go, she said. Dollor was used to traveling to all the Duke’s movie locations, she said.

But what he likes best of all is listening to the sounds in one of his old movies. Debra plays the old movies for him.

“He gets all excited when he hears the shooting and that voice,” she said. “Then the ears get alert, and he’s looking for John Wayne.”

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