Saturday Open Thread | Shariah Harris To Make History in the Sport of Polo

Posted on July 8, 2017 by rikyrah

Pennsylvania teen, 19, to make history as the first black woman to ever play in top tier of US polo after discovering it by accident 12 years ago
By Associated Press and Mary Kekatos For Dailymail.com
Published: 14:06 EDT, 29 June 2017 | Updated: 17:55 EDT, 29 June 2017

A Pennsylvania teenager will make history as the first black woman to ever play in the top tier of US polo.

Shariah Harris, 19, from southwest Philadelphia, who plays collegiately at Cornell University in New York, will mount up Friday for the Postage Stamp Farm polo team in the Silver Cup tournament at the Greenwich Polo Club in Connecticut.

Brenda Lynn, a spokeswoman for the Museum of Polo and Hall of Fame, said Shariah will be playing a form of polo known as high-goal polo, which refers to the players’ handicap – or numerical measure of potential ability.

Players are rated on a scale from minus-two to 10. Minus-two indicates a novice player, while a player rated at 10 shows the highest handicap possible.

She said the stares, the inappropriate comments and the whispering that comes with being a black woman playing polo can be discouraging at times, but it won’t stop her from riding.

‘If me playing will mean opportunities to play for other kids like me, then I’m perfectly happy to be breaking down doors,’ Shariah said.

‘I just keep quiet, put on my boots and go out and play.’

Shariah said she would not be playing polo or even riding horses if her mother, Sharmell, had not made a wrong turn while driving in Philadelphia 12 years ago.

She ended up on a dead-end road at a barn and riding ring in Fairmount Park where other minority children were on horses.

It turned out to be the home of the Work to Ride program, a nonprofit organization that teaches urban kids from low-income homes to ride and gets them involved in equestrian events.

To be part of the program, the kids work in the stables, muck out the stalls and groom the horses.

‘As a mother of three children on a single income, I saw it as an opportunity to make their lives better,’ said Sharmell, who ended up moving her family from southwest Philadelphia to Upper Darby, a few miles away.

‘Instead of a soccer mom, I became a barn mom.’

This undated photo provided by the Work to Ride program shows 19-year-old Shariah Harris playing polo at the Polo Club in Lancaster, Pa. Harris, who grew up in single-parent home just outside of west Philadelphia, is set to become the first African American woman to play in a top-tier U.S. polo event when she mounts up Friday, June 30, 2017, for the Postage Stamp Farm polo team in the Silver Cup at the tony Greenwich Polo Club in Connecticut. (Lezlie Hiner/Work to Ride via AP)

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42 Responses to Saturday Open Thread | Shariah Harris To Make History in the Sport of Polo

  6. rikyrah says:
    July 8, 2017 at 7:10 pm

    I love Despicable Me…1,2, and 3…LOL

    Reply
  7. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    July 8, 2017 at 6:49 pm

    So frightening. So scary. I ache for Dejuan’s family and loved ones.

    *tears*

    https://twitter.com/TheRoot/status/883823074168242176

    Reply
  8. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    July 8, 2017 at 6:39 pm

    https://twitter.com/CivilRightsCntr/status/883460622863798272

    From article linked in above tweet:

    “The University of Mississippi is taking major strides in acknowledging its racist history. The institution, affectionately known as Ole Miss, announced plans on Thursday to recognize pre-Civil War campus buildings that were built by slaves.

    “According to NBC, in addition to placing plaques on buildings built by slaves, the university will also remove the name of white supremacist James K. Vardaman from a campus building. Vardaman was the governor of Mississippi from 1904 to 1908…

    “The move is part of an ongoing process on the campus to reconcile with its past, provide historical context, and create a more welcoming environment for a diverse student body. In recent years, the university has had several instances of racism, including a 2015 incident in which a noose was placed around the neck of a James Meredith statue on campus.”

    Reply
  13. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    July 8, 2017 at 5:21 pm

    https://twitter.com/Crystal1Johnson/status/883766598884089856

    I looked for her twitter page and found it! Here is more of her art. I will add extra under “reply” here.
    https://twitter.com/ohsocerena/status/836380731802779648

    Reply
  17. SouthernGirl2 says:
    July 8, 2017 at 3:34 pm

    Idiot wants war with one billion Muslims. Backwoods ass clown. SIT DOWN! No one is afraid of your hillbilly ass.

    https://twitter.com/RawStory/status/883784028209500160

    Reply
  18. Ametia says:
    July 8, 2017 at 12:35 pm

    Altemeyer on Trumpā€™s Supporters
    7 Jul 2017 John Dean

    When writing my book Conservatives Without Conscience (Penguin, 2007) about the authoritarianism that was gaining influence in the Republican Party in the early 2000s, I read most everything that social scientists had to say about folks with such dispositions. Particularly helpful was psychology professor Bob Altemeyerā€™s book for Harvard University Press, The Authoritarian Specter (1996). No one has done more ground-breaking work in testing the nature of these people than this professor, who was then at the University of Manitoba in Canada. A native of St. Louis who had done his graduate work at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Bob is also a keen student of American politics. Indeed, his son is in the business in Canada, and a member of the Manitoba Legislature.

    I thought it would be helpful to many Americans to be exposed to Bobā€™s scholarly studies, and convinced him to write them up in a book for the general reader. He did, and placed it online for anyone to read for free. See The Authoritarians. (Last time I checked, over 670,000 people had visited the book, and hopefully read it!)

    https://verdict.justia.com/2017/07/07/altemeyer-trumps-supporters

    Reply
  29. rikyrah says:
    July 8, 2017 at 5:09 am

    Good Morning, Everyone šŸ˜ šŸ˜šŸ˜

    Reply

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