About the author
Rachel Rivers Coffey was a newspaperwoman and writer. Her father, R C Rivers, owned the Watauga Democrat, a weekly newspaper located in Boone, and Watauga County’s oldest business. Rachel Rivers Coffey and her husband eventually took over the paper. She and her husband were great benefactors; they donated Rivers Park to the community, an area of woodland containing the state’s largest maple tree. The family also supported various educational programmes. After Rachel Rivers Coffey died, the family started the Rivers-Coffey Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing at the Appalachian State University which “annually sponsors the residency of a writer of national prominence at Appalachian State University”.
Rachel Rivers Coffey wrote one horse book. Her heroine Elizabeth has the classic horsey girl’s longing for a wonderful, competition-winning horse, but when she achieves her dream and gets a horse, what turns up isn’t quite what she dreamed of.
Finding the book
The book is easy to find in the USA. It was not published in the UK.
Links and sources
North Carolina newspapers (link no longer extant)
Rachel Rivers Coffey at Watauga online
The Rachel Rivers Coffey Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing
Many thanks to Lisa Catz for the photograph and summary.
Bibliography (horse books only)
A Horse Like Mr Ragman
Scribner, New York, 1977, 149 pp
Scholastic, paperback, 1980
Elizabeth is 12, and she dreams of owning a horse like Eva’s. Eva is rich, and keeps her beautiful horse at the stable that Elizabeth rides at. When Elizabeth’s father finally buys her a horse, it’s nothing like Eva’s. It’s a shaggy pinto, and Elizabeth is thoroughly embarrassed, until his talents are discovered.
