"A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust and a hearty "Hi Yo Silver!"

Those were the first words of every episode of the great tv series "The Lone Ranger" starring Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels going from 1949-1957. I have early memories of my 5 year old self being at a babysitter's while jumping up and down excitedly on the couch with my fellow babysittee and friend, Clifford while these words rang out with "Lone" himself galloping across the screen.
These were re-runs of course, but they grabbed my imagination just as powerfully as anything else that was up to speed with the times, like Space 1999 or Six Million Dollar Man, (am I dating myself or what?)
Nowadays the anti-hero seems to be the type of role model that a lot of folks are drawn to with a grungy look, and little regard for any personal morals or values, but I've always really really loved the hero that has a good heart.
I love that line in the 2011 Captain America movie, when Dr. Erskine says to Steve Rogers, "Whatever happens tomorrow, you must promise me one thing. That you will stay who you are. Not a perfect soldier, but a good man."
These are some of the reasons I've always liked the Lone Ranger.

A little while ago, I stumbled upon some white horse figurines made by Schliech. Amazingly detailed, right in scale with the tons of 3 3/4" people figures that are everywhere, and I thought with a little work, one would make a great Silver (Lone Ranger's horse).
So with that, I started brainstorming...

 

 I started with two horses, originally intending to do everything twice so I could get a pose of him in a regular "walk" and one in a "rearing" pose. I soon found that it was enough work that I only wanted to do this once...

 

I decided to go with the more practical "walking" pose, and drew out where I was going to put the saddle and rein straps.

And then I built up the saddle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After sculpting some of the straps and the horse blanket on, I applied my cardboard saddle base.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then I filled the saddle in and sanded it down.

 

 

Put on the stirrups...

 Then I added a little loop of metal on the straps near Silver's mouth for attaching the reins later.

 

 

 I decided the underside of the belt "keeping the saddle on" needed a buckle, so after first sculpting it backwards with the strap coming out the wrong side of the buckle, I reversed it.

 

I thought  it would be a great to add a lasso to the saddle so I created a hook to loop one over. 

 

 

After I covered the hook with epoxy and painted all his straps black after sanding them down, I added some silver bling to his chest straps, painted him a brighter white and added a lasso I made especially for him.

 

That pretty much finishes up what I did with Silver. Gallup on over to part two of this western tale to see about his great masked rider!