Answer Man Unveils the Tale Behind a Mannequin and His Horse

There's a stuffed horse at Mount Vernon, a really good-looking white horse that made me wonder: Where did they get the horse that supposedly looks so much like George Washington's horse? Did they raise a horse and then kill it for the display or did they just wait for a matching horse to die? It didn't look old, so could they have killed it just to stuff it?

-- Northern Virginia reader

When he got the nod to provide the distinctive white gelding on which a forensically accurate reproduction of Gen. George Washington would sit at Mount Vernon's new museum, Frank Zitz put the word out: "I need a white horse."

Frank is the head of Frank J. Zitz and Co., an outfit in Rhinebeck, N.Y., that can provide a taxidermy version of anything from a songbird to an elephant. One of Washington's best-known horses was Blueskin, a distinctive white horse the exhibit's curators wanted to evoke.

Frank knew that Amish farmers in Lancaster County, Pa., have many workhorses. Through contacts in that community, he let it be known that he was in the market for a large white horse, preferably one with its thick winter coat. If any were to die in the coming year, he might be interested. One did, and Frank sent someone to pick it up.

Not the entire horse. After its various exterior dimensions were measured, the horse was skinned -- "just like you would skin a beef cow," Frank explained -- and the skin salted and dried. This was sent to a tannery on Long Island for treatment. "Then I get the horse back completely clean," he said. "It looks just like a fur coat with hooves on it."

The horse's measurements were used to construct a body-shaped Styrofoam armature. Clay veins and muscles were applied. The Styrofoam was mounted on a steel frame.

Frank said that most people think taxidermy is like embalming. "It's really nothing like that," he said. "It's really sculpture. . . . Posturing the animals is everything."

The exhibit depicts Valley Forge, a low point in Washington's military campaigns. Frank made the horse's neck droop with fatigue. "He was supposed to look regal but also supposed to look tired."

Armature in place, the skin was draped over and glued down, the seams sewn, glass eyes inserted. The horse got a wash with some whitening shampoo and a blow-dry. Then detail work was performed: airbrushing around the nostrils and mouth. (By the way, the stuffed horse has something in common with the real Washington: His teeth are dentures.)