An era ends
Horseman closes the Two Winds gate one last time
By Nancy Needham  nancy@theacorn.com

BILL SPARKES/Acorn Newspapers CHANGE OF PACE--Alvin "Bully" Caddin of Newbury Park closed the gates of the Two Winds Equestrian Center on April 1. Now retired, he's found the time to paint his home.

Alvin "Bully" Caddin closed the gate on his dream for the last time and drove away from what was once Two Winds Equestrian Ranch in Newbury Park.

On April 1 the Conejo Open Space Conservation Agency, which owns the land, began subleasing the equestrian center to Circle K riding stables.

With that change, the man who remembers when the site was only a pasture now rides into the sunset.

Caddin, who describes himself as "old as dirt," grew up in Whittier, Calif. His mother called him Bully because of the sounds he made as a baby, he said. He became involved with horses at about age 12.

When he was young and impressionable, Caddin was taken under the wing of Roy Stevens, an old man from Oklahoma. Stevens taught him to ride, shoe and doctor horses back when vets were hard to come by, Caddin recalled.

"Roy saw that I had the horse business in my blood- I loved it; I wanted it with all my heart," Caddin said.

His love for horses, he said, actually saved his life when he was a teenager. A friend tried to talk the reluctant Caddin into going to a party, but he declined, staying back to be with the horses. That night, his friend was shot and killed in a gang-related incident, Caddin said.

"That was when the gangs were just coming around," he said.

Caddin sold his first horse when he was 16, he said. He's been a horse trader ever since.

Some horses are too special to let go. One big old albino was such a horse. Caddin's voice grows tender when he speaks of the white horse he had for 30 years.

"He was always willing to work hard. I let him retire so he could just walk around," Caddin said. "He was a good old horse."

Now it's Caddin who's being put out to pasture. He's going to spend his time horse trading and is planning to set up shop in Santa Paula. He plans to keep busy.

"I've been rode hard and put up wet too many times," he said.

A horse shouldn't be treated that way. It puts their health in jeopardy, he said.

Caddin didn't want to give up his dream of running a horse stable in the spot where he personally put the posts in the ground to build the fences. He regrets not buying the land so no one could take it away from him.

But he doesn't regret the time he put into mentoring the children who came to his stable to ride the horses.

They would come and just hang around, he said. Soon they were learning how to take care of the horses. If they stuck around, Caddin said, he would see if they had the love for horses Stevens once saw in him. If they did, if horse-loving blood ran through their veins, he would saddle up a horse for them and let them ride.

"If they were kids who appreciated and loved horses- even if they didn't have the money- we welcomed them," Caddin said. "If they'd follow the rules and not cuss, drink or smoke, there was always a place for them."

Thousands of kids came through his stables, he said.

"Out of all the kids who came through, only one of them ever went astray," he recalled. "They all grew up to be good citizens- some are vets, some police officers, all productive and good."

Over the decades, Caddin has tried to give to other children what Stevens gave to him.

"Knowing you did something like that for kids, nobody can ever take that away from me," he said.