Sally and Roddy Moore are dedicated collectors who have pioneered in researching and collecting the arts of their region, the Shenandoah Valley and the southern Piedmont. I visited them recently after a decade’s absence, and though it was clear that their collection had grown and changed over the years, the focus of their lives seemed the same: they are casual, yet disciplined, their days shaped as much by their devotion to each other and to their animals, as to their shared interests.
The house is a lively place. The dogs—two Hungarian Vizslas named Ginger and Dixie—seem as comfortable on the couch with visitors by day as they are beneath their owners’ bed at night. Jaws, the African Gray parrot that the Moores have nurtured for two decades, still punctuates the day as he mimics Roddy affectionately calling “Sally…….Sally.” Smokie, the cat, saunters in and out, while outside, three large iron dinosaurs guard the house, the yard, and the nearby woods.
The Moores are rightfully proud of their home, their broad range of interests, and their incredible collection. Yet before we sat down to discuss their lives and their things, they wanted to show me the stable where fifteen horses beckon them from bed each morning at six. The horses have earned the couple an international reputation in the equestrian field, but it was only when I was shown into the adjoining carriage house to see the horse-drawn wagonettes that they use for coaching events, and the 1932 Ford Roadster of a type that Roddy first customized in high school, that I understood how multifaceted this couple’s talents and interests are.
The Moores’ early lives provide subtle hints of the collectors they would become. Sally Flieger Moore was born in New Jersey and raised in Bermuda. She loved the water and her family’s dogs, but what really changed her life was the pony her parents gave her when she was seven. She was a natural horsewoman with a highly developed eye for the beauty of an animal’s conformation. In the end, this eye would not only lead her to build an international reputation as a horse breeder, but also play a vital role in her life as a collector.
Roddy grew up in Welch, McDowell County, West Virginia, where his mother taught junior high school math and his father was an electrical contractor. He talks fondly of his childhood friends—mostly the children of Czech, Hungarian, Polish, and Italian miners whose families had fled Europe in the wake of two world wars. He reports that they gave him a tremendous respect for people from widely varied cultures. As a teenager Roddy began to hunt with these friends, and to collect muzzle-loading rifles. He was, he reports, also hooked on hot rods and drag racing.
His youthful experiences in McDowell County spurred Roddy’s lifelong interest in the complexities of southern culture and history. When it came time for college he packed up for Virginia Polytechnic Institute to study history, political science, and sociology. One of his best undergraduate experiences was not an academic one: he became part owner of a coffeehouse called Books, Strings and Things, where he was responsible for booking musicians for evening entertainment.
Pickle Dish, American China Manufactory (Bonnin and Morris), Philadelphia, 1771-72. Soft-paste porcelain with lead glaze; height 4 3/16, width 4 1/2
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