Susanne Stadler has been a steward with Utah’s Cultural Site Stewardship Program since the beginning! Susanne started volunteering in 2021, and we are excited to introduce her today.
Susanne is currently one of around 900 people living in Escalante. However, she grew up just a few miles east of her current home — across the ocean in Switzerland. Searching for what she described as “an unpredictable life,” she participated in an international au pair exchange program in Vermont. Later, she moved to California, where she worked as a hairdresser. California brought opportunities to explore interests she hadn’t been able to explore before, like her love of horses.
Horses and the Journey to Escalante
Susanne says that, for as long as she can remember, “I remember loving horses.” Susanne began taking horseback riding lessons at the age of 27 at a local college. Soon, she owned her own horse.
Horses, in part, would bring her to Utah. While traveling back from a pack string training in Colorado, she took an alternate route through Escalante and “…fell in love with a town,” she said.
Susanne has now been living in Escalante full-time for seven years with her partner, eight horses, two donkeys, five dogs, and a cat. Now retired from hairdressing, she keeps herself busy volunteering. She volunteers as an EMT, with UCSS, with the local nonprofit animal clinic, and with public lands stewardship organizations. When she does have free time, she enjoys reading, gardening, and camping and hiking with her horses and donkeys. She especially loves learning and exploring history and science.
Following the History
Susanne may have fallen in love with the town of Escalante, but she also fell in love with learning about the land and history surrounding it: “I look at the Kaiparowits [Plateau] right now and there’s millions of years of history in front of my eyes… It puts everything in perspective, and I’m young forever compared to millions of years!”
Learning about history has been a part of her life since childhood in Switzerland. Although, she says, she didn’t love learning historical dates in school, she was fascinated by the true stories of the past. “My little town was first mentioned 1100 years ago,” she says, “so history is a big part of our lives.”
Even her horse has a connection to history. The mare is a Spanish Barb, a breed brought to the Americas by the Spanish. Her lineage as a member of the Wilbur-Cruce Barb strain can be traced back to the missions of a specific priest in the 1680s, making her a piece of history herself. “When you follow the history of the horse, you follow the history of people,” Susanne says. “[Horses] are very uniquely intertwined with history.”
UCSS, she says, has been a great way to get out with her historic horse and learn more about local history.
Protecting and Learning Together: The Big UCSS Picture
“I feel like I’m just scratching the surface of what this program has to offer,” she says. “And what I really like — besides I like to continue to learn about history — about this program is that it’s very broad. That it’s really non-political, non-partisan; that it’s encompassing people from all over… This is, in the big picture, something that’s so important for all of us. We can realize that we all enjoy the same thing and we all want to protect that, too.”
Whether she’s monitoring her sites, helping guide runners with her horse at the Stewardship Strut, or exploring UCSS’ other events and opportunities, Susanne is a great part of the UCSS community. The passion for history and learning she has, as well as the time she donates to help safeguard Utah’s cultural heritage, is greatly appreciated!
