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DAYTON - Horses once again enjoyed the spotlight on the roads of Dayton.

Relegated to pastures and shows since the invention of the automobile, horses of multiple breeds took to the streets for the Dayton Labor Day Parade Monday morning.

"My favorite part of the rodeo weekend is the parade," said Rose Hoffman, of Fort Dodge, as she sat next to the curb waiting for the procession to begin. "I used to have a horse. We used it to help herd the cattle, but there are some beautiful horses here today."

As the magnificent creatures trotted down the parade path through town, people smiled and waved at the riders they knew. Some riders were family, some friends, and some were in clubs.

The Lake View Riders Saddle Club was in attendance, along with the Windy River Saddle Club of Humboldt and Dayton Wrangler Saddle Club.

Besides the equines, candy was a crowd-pleaser with the younger generations.

Eight-year-old Jonathan Madden of Fort Dodge knew exactly what he was going for as soon as the fire trucks blew their starting sirens.

"I want to get candy," Madden said. When prompted, Madden divulged he was out for suckers.

"I know what my mom wants," Madden said with a smile. "Bit-O-Honey."

Julie Madden laughed and said her son was right on target. As soon as the candy started to fly, Jonathan Madden and his brothers Nathanial, 8, and Joshua and Ryan, both 5, scrambled to collect as many sugary sweets as they could.

"They really love the horses too," Julie Madden said, as Ryan hollered out hi to the horses passing by.

Paul Wolf, of Farnhamville, kicked up the presentation of his ponies a notch. As a retirement project, Wolf built a stage coach for his Shetland-Welsh ponies to pull.

"It's home-built," Wolf said. "We modeled it off of an Abbot-Downing stagecoach and sized it so it was right for the ponies. I built it in my shop, and it was a project requiring a lot of time and effort."

Wolf said the process was worth it. He was able to share the moment with two other generations; his daughter Marcie Boerner, of Gowrie, and her son, Logan. The crew made it back from Nashua just in time for the morning parade.

"He's my shotgun," Wolf said of Logan, who literally held the model shotgun riding on top the stagecoach behind his mom and grandpa.

But the most famous horses on the Dayton pavement were from the Cervi Rodeo Company.

The family-owned business from Colorado has been producing some of the nation's best rodeo stock for more than 60 years.

For nearly five years, the award-winning rodeo stock contractors have brought their bucking broncos and bulls to the Dayton rodeo.

"We have another rodeo we stock in Fort Madison on Wednesday," Scott Cervi said, "and it just made sense to work at Dayton too. The people here are just wonderful to work with. It's a lot of fun."

The Cervi crew raise all their own horses, and just as some horses are bred to run, the Cervi stock are bred to buck, and these rodeo stock are truly crowd-pleasers. In fact, the company's horses are so good they've taken up to 20 of them to the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas.

The same quality is brought to the Dayton Rodeo.

"The ability to buck is all in the genetics," Scotty Cervi said. "It's hit-and-miss, but we keep producing some of the best. We've been lucky."

The final rodeo played out Monday at 1:30 p.m. after the parade.

Contact Lindsey Ory at (515) 573-2141 or lindsey@messengernews.net