Clark Bradley

Clark Bradley joins his father, Bailey “Stretch” Bradley, in the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame. No one conditioned, developed, trained and showed horses any better than the Bradleys. Not that you would have known it by talking to them.

A humble man who consistently gave of himself to anyone around him, Clark thrived on helping people succeed while taking no credit for what he did. Clark had a hand in crafting and developing reining and the National Reining Horse Association and was instrumental in the success of the All American Quarter Horse Congress and the Ohio Quarter Horse Association. Clark was an AQHA director emeritus and sits in the OQHA and NRHA halls of fame, having served as president of both associations. Clark affected the lives of horsemen, trainers and riders throughout our industry as an instructor at the University of Findlay’s equestrian program since its inception.

The 2001 Don Burt AQHA Professional Horseman of the Year, Clark was an advocate of youth and coached national championship teams at Findlay.

Holding judging cards with AQHA, NRHA and the National Snaffle Bit Association, Clark judged both the AQHA and AQHYA world championship shows, other competitions all over the United States and Canada, and in Australia, Britain, Belgium, Brazil, Germany and Switzerland.

“Dad was a great horseman and teacher who loved his family,” his son, C. R., says. “His knowledge of all the events and how to get a horse broke really set him apart from other trainers. He was diverse–he could train pleasure horses, reiners, cutters, ropers. He showed in everything except English, but he could train those horses, too. On top of that, he could really teach it to other people, to his students at Findlay and the trainers who worked for him. He was very fundamentally sound and very correct in how he trained a horse, always got them very broke before ever getting them into different disciplines. Dad was very detailed in what he did, from how you take care of horses to how you feed them to how you start them to how you go into disciplines. He could teach students whatever it was they wanted to do, and train horses for whatever they could do. Dad trained a horse for where it was, not for where someone thinks it should be.”

Clark died January 18, 2022. He was inducted into the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2023.

The Hall of Fame is about honoring those who have dedicated their life to the American Quarter Horse and to making a major impact on both the people in the Association and the horses in the breed. Clark Bradley checked every box and then some. He was inducted into the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2023.