Cunningham Ranch features octagonal house/barn
By ROWENA PLETT
Staff writer
Headquarters of the Cunningham Ranch northeast of Burns is quite an unusual sight. The only building on the property is a unique octagonal house/barn combination.
Even more unique is a central interior octagonal horse arena covered by a high canopy which sits atop the entire structure and contains windows to provide natural lighting for the arena.
The ranch is owned by Sandra "Sandi" Cunningham, daughter of the renowned Kansas distance runner, Glenn Cunningham. (See sidebar.)
She raises straight Egyptian Arabian horses registered with the Kansas Arabian Horse Society and The Pyramid Society, an international organization with headquarters in Lexington, Ky., which seeks to protect Egyptian bloodlines and promote breeding of straight Egyptian horses.
Sandi's custom-built Morton building was constructed in 2000. Visualize it as similar to a donut except it has eight sides and the hole is covered and part of the building.
One-third of the "donut" is devoted to living quarters. Interior windows and doors enable Sandi to view stalls, corrals, and the indoor arena from every room of the house.
"An ideal situation at foaling time!" she said.
A large porch with limestone pillars extends along one side of the structure and overlooks a wide expanse of bluestem pasture and nearby Turkey Creek.
The opposite third of the "donut" contains six horse stalls and an office, all which open to outside corrals as well as the inside arena.
Large overhead doors and entrances are at the north and south ends of the building, separating the living quarters from the horse barn and providing access for stock trailers to the central arena.
No manicured lawn surrounds this building. The landscape is a part of the setting, which is made up of native plants and flowers.
Established by Glenn Cunningham in 1939, the ranch originally included 822 acres. He built a herd of 250 horses of various breeds.
After Glenn and his wife, Margaret (Speir), a native of Peabody, separated, Sandi and her older sister, Sara, moved with their mother to Iowa. They spent school years in Iowa and summers at the ranch with their father, who remarried and had several more children.
Sandi recalls riding Arabian stallions at the ranch. On occasion, the family traveled to Cottonwood Falls to participate in a parade on horseback. They took their supplies in a covered wagon pulled by a team of Belgiums.
After high school, Sandi pursued a career as an occupational therapist and educator, obtaining a Ph.D. in her field. She was a clinical hypnotherapist and worked at LSU Medical Center in New Orleans, La., for many years and retired in 2002.
Sandi and Sara eventually inherited the ranch. The two sisters, who never married, had hoped to live at the ranch together, but Sara encountered health problems and died in 1999. Sandi then decided to build a new house there and manage the ranch herself.
In order to afford the new structure, she sold off some of the property as well as property at Peabody inherited from her mother. She retained 320 acres, or a half-section, of the Cunningham Ranch. It lies in Chase County just east of the Marion County line but has a Burns address.
The new headquarters is located at the end of a dead-end road, two miles from the nearest through road. Sandi said she paid Chase County a large sum to gravel the road to her place. She also installed two miles of pipe fencing.
Her enterprise, known as Flint Hills Royal Arabians, LLC, at present includes four brood mares, three stallions, and a gelding. Three of the mares are in foal. They are bred to one of the top 10 Arabian stallions in the country.
Sandi uses Internet connections to advertise and sell stock. The stallions and gelding are for sale.
Horses aren't the only animals on the ranch. Two alpacas produce wool for Sandi's spinning hobby, or to sell to other spinners.
Two peacocks spend most of their time in the interior arena. "Shorty," a miniature goat which Sandi calls Billy the Kid, was adopted from an older couple who could no longer care for it. Willy the dog was a "rescue."
A small pond near the house is stocked with a species of fish called koi, popular in Japan and similar to goldfish. Sandi feeds them every day.
The 66-year-old woman plans to spend the remainder of her life at the ranch. It takes strength and stamina to take care of a bunch of horses, but she said she has a strong constitution and expects to have a long life.
When drummer Charlie Watts recently appeared with the Rolling Stones at Wichita, Sandi attended the concert and took him two sweatshirts from the Kansas Arabian Horse Society. He and his wife raise Arabian horses in England.
"I liked all the breeds my father had," Sandra said, "but I couldn't afford them all so I settled on Arabians. They have spirit and endurance."
To learn more about them, visit her website at www.fhrarabians.com.
