Yet this simple photograph, a family and their horses in a beautiful part of the world masks an emotive story which links history, compassion and a deep desire to maintain that which once was.

On the left meet Rosie, the ideal mount for a young rider like Brydi Fittock from North Dorrigo Pony Club.

Pony club kids learn how to ride well and care for their animals and their gear from tutors who’ve spent as much time in the saddle as most of us do in a car.

Check out the littlies when they’re 13 or 15 or more, riding hands and heels in competition on big horses. No fear. (And most of them are girls.)  If that doesn’t spark admiration go back to your Ipad. 

In the middle is Guy Fawkes Cassie a favourite of Dorrigo Show Society President, Sally Duckett.

Cassie’s name gives a clue to her remarkable history.

In 2000 someone in government decided to remove large numbers of brumbies from the 107,000 hectare Guy Fawkes National Park, near Ebor. More than 600 were slaughtered in an aerial shooting campaign.

Television news footage of bloated, upturned carcasses provoked an enormous public protest and the shooting campaign was abandoned. The problem of too many horses in the national park remained.

In 2004 the Guy Fawkes Heritage Horse Association began the first of hundreds of removals of horses which were then “rehomed”, gently broken in and found new lives as working horses, hacks and even well cared for family pets.

The brumbies are directly related to Walers, a unique breed of Australian horses which carried the Light Horsemen in World War One and made the last full scale cavalry charge in history at the Battle of Beersheba, Israel, in 1917.

The Walers and their Guy Fawkes descendents are the only wild horses in Australia proven to have heritage value.

They are known for their gentle temperament, “floating paces, loyalty and sure footedness”.

Cassie is such a heritage horse, rehomed as a two year old by Sally and husband, Arnold, on their 800 acre property near North Dorrigo.

She is part of Australian history and will have a home with Ducketts for as long as she lives.

On the right, Shanlee Duckett sits on Joe, a good 25 years old now and standing more than 16 hands high. He’s a Clydesdale, one of the largest breeds of horses and, in his later years, still weighs around 750kg.

Perhaps millions of horses like Joe helped build Australia, pulling anything that had wheels or slides or skids, sometimes alone, sometimes yoked to as many as 17 other great horses dragging wagons loaded with wool across inland plains.

Joe spent most of his life pulling single blade ploughs, scufflers and other vintage farm equipment on a mixed property near Armidale.

Arnold Duckett found Joe when his working days were over and gave him lifetime lodgings in paddocks overlooking the Upper Nymboida River.

Joe pays the rent by pulling a wonderful mix of vintage carts, wagons and sulkies during occasional public appearances.

In a shed nearby is a remarkable collection of harness, trace chains, a fully restored tip dray, sulkies and other almost forgotten horse tackle which Joe probably will wear or pull or use one day. He seems quite happy with this arrangement.

Joe loves people. He’s gentle, approachable but a little rugged when he nods his head.

After all, he is a very BIG horse.