Johannes Orgeldinger is the first person from outside the United States to be AQHA president. The international horseman from Grosswallstadt, Germany, achieved the office in 2010.
An avid competitor in AQHA, Johannes won multiple European championships in pleasure, trail and cutting. His wife, Astrid, was the first AQHA amateur versatility champion in Europe.
Since 1982, the Orgeldingers have bred, raised and trained Quarter Horses on their JOMM Ranches near Grosswallstadt. That same year, he and other German Quarter Horse owners had their first AQHA-approved show. In 1982, Johannes helped organize the first European Championship of the American Quarter Horse.
In 1992, the Orgeldingers founded Main River Quarter Horses at Gainesville, Texas. Main River Quarter Horses has evolved into a successful breeding and training operation that produced winners in major cutting and reining events in the United States and Europe.
Johannes spent more than a quarter century as president or as a member of the board of directors of the German Quarter Horse Association. He was elected to the AQHA Board of Directors in 1996, has served on the stud book and registration committee and the nomination and credentials committee and was a member of the AQHA Affiliate Council.
On the AQHA Executive Committee and as president, Johannes was involved in international and animal welfare matters, and focused on getting the big cattle ranches more involved with the Association. His slogan was “An Association that does not care about its past will have no future.”
A founder of the German Futurity and Maturity, Johannes was twice a committee member of the Federation Equestre International, or FEI, the governing body for riding worldwide and the World Equestrian Games, where he was discipline manager for reining.
Johannes Orgeldinger was inducted into the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2016.
Biography updated as of March 2016.