Vintage Bona Allen Western Saddle 15 Seat Horse Ride Bucking Bronc Leather
You're viewing a Vintage Bona Allen Western Saddle with a 15 seat. It is in ok condition and has been worn. Made in Buford, GA, hand tooled leather.
Saddle extremely comfortable for ranch work, trail riding and everything in between. Would fit a higher wither horse best.
6 gullet, typical of the era which it was made. This was a well made saddle and remains in good condition. Please view all images provided.
This firm, established in 1873, operated a tannery and leather goods factory. Its management met the business threat of the motor age with an assurance that has paid off handsomely. True, there wasn't enough demand, to support the industry on the scale of pre-Model T days. But concentration of the few scattered users of saddles, bridles, harnesses and horse collars proved enough to keep Bona Allen well supplied with orders. Today the 86-year-old tannery and leather goods factory may well be the largest of its kind in the country. Stanley Allen, grandson of the founder and secretary-treasurer of the company, puts it this way: If there's a larger one, we've never heard of it.Bona Allen's two major divisions, each housed in a separate building several stories high and a block long, represent a blend of the present and the past. Modern machinery is evident throughout the tannery division, but a great deal of hand labor is still necessary in converting tough, stiff, hair-covered cowhides into smooth, flexible sheets of leather. In the "harness" factory, a designation carried over from the heyday of the horse and buggy, the majority of the plant is devoted to manufacturing riding equipment. Here, highly-skilled craftsmen (and women) painstakingly cut, stitch and hand-tool the high quality Bona Allen leather especially made to withstand rugged use.
Saddles, bridles, halters, harnesses, stirrups, and a dozen or more different kinds of riding accessories are cut and assembled in this section. The company takes special pride in its saddle making. Its catalog lists 86 different models ranging from simple jump saddles to heavy, ornate "westerns: The latter carry such sagebrush-scented names as "Rio Chico", "Cheyenne Chief", "Texas Quarter Horse", and "Cow Country. While some designs can be stamped by machine to give the appearance of hand-tooling, the majority of Bona Allen's saddles carry the label "fully hand carved".This means hours of work with mallet and stamping tools have gone into carving the intricate floral designs traditional for western saddles. To the layman, a saddle may appear to be nothing more than a few pieces of leather tacked or riveted to a wooden frame. But an average saddle requires 128 different manufacturing operations.
Cost may run well over a hundred dollars. Small wonder that cowboys as portrayed in TV westerns will shoulder their saddles for miles when their horses are crippled or shot. " While the saddlery is considered the "glamour end of the business, the tannery continues to form the financial backbone of the company. A number of well known sporting goods firms are among the company's customers. The item "Vintage Bona Allen Western Saddle 15 Seat Horse Ride Bucking Bronc Leather" is in sale since Thursday, June 02, 2016. This item is in the category "Sporting Goods\Outdoor Sports\Equestrian\Tack-Western\Saddles". The seller is "prairiegrit" and is located in Jamestown, North Dakota.This item can be shipped to United States, to Canada, to United Kingdom, DK, RO, SK, BG, CZ, FI, HU, LV, LT, MT, EE, to Australia, GR, PT, CY, SI, to Japan, to China, SE, KR, ID, to Taiwan, TH, to Belgium, to France, to Hong Kong, to Ireland, to Netherlands, PL, to Spain, to Italy, to Germany, to Austria, RU, IL, to Mexico, to New Zealand, PH, SG, to Switzerland, NO, SA, UA, AE, QA, KW, BH, HR, MY.