It's hard not to love Tennessee, say the Mortons

Dr. Bryant Morton, right, holds one of the family's curly horses while his wife, Dr. Wendy Morton, brushes her.
(T-G Photo by Sadie Fowler) [Order this photo]

It is exactly the window she'd been looking for her whole life.

Dream farm

This is one of the barns the Mortons built on Golden Gaits Farm. Most of the wood came from Elizabethtown, N.C., where the couple used to operate their own veterinary clinic.
(T-G Photo by Sadie Fowler)

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"This is my dream job," said Wendy, looking at her two young sons as they played in the barn. "I get to take care of my boys, garden, cook, breed horses ... I grew up in the suburbs. My parents used to swear I was adopted."

Wendy and Bryant moved to Tennessee in 2006, after selling their mixed animal veterinary clinic in North Carolina and purchasing their 240-acre farm in Flat Creek.

"Tennessee is a hard place not to love," said Bryant, explaining he and his wife fell in love with the area after coming to town to watch several horse shows.

When hearts meet

Wendy grew up in the suburbs of Wisconsin. She always loved horses, and even got a horse when she was 17 (the horse recently passed away at the age of 31). Her love for horses and animals in general led her into the veterinary medicine program at the University of Madison.

"During my senior year of vet school I did an externship at the clinic where (Bryant) worked," said Wendy, although Bryant had not yet gone to veterinary school at this time.

After graduation, Wendy took a job at this North Carolina clinic.

Soon after, Bryant enrolled into the Tuskegee University School of Veterinary Medicine, located in Alabama.

"I moved there to be with him," Wendy said.

When Bryant graduated he worked at a clinic in Alabama for about a year.

"He had only been out a year when we opened our own practice," Wendy said. "I think people thought we were crazy."

Changes and challenges

Wendy and Bryant, who have now been married for 16 years, opened their practice in the small, rural town of Elizabethtown, N.C., Bryant's home state. There was only one other veterinarian in their county, an elderly gentleman, and so the Mortons received a lot of traffic through their small and large animal clinic.

Wendy said they transformed an old Arabian horse farm into the clinic, where their small animal practice took up one side of the aisle, and large animals on the other.

"It was mostly small animal," Wendy said. "We did large animals mainly to support our horse habit."

After one year, business was great and Wendy and Bryant were just about ready to start a family when troubling news came.

Wendy found a lump in her breast and learned she had breast cancer. She underwent chemotherapy and other treatments and fought the disease head on. But beating it did take time, energy and determination.

"Cancer changes your priorities," Wendy said.

New beginnings

In 1997, Wendy, 31 at the time, was cancer free and she and Bryant were ready to fulfill their dream of starting a family, even if it was a few years later than they had planned.

She got pregnant, and at that time, the couple realized they wanted to slow down and pursue another dream -- to purchase a farm and enjoy family life. Very acquainted with horses as a result of their careers, both developed a strong love for spotted saddle horses and walking horses, and they knew Tennessee was the place for them.

"We looked for three years," Wendy said. "The more we looked the more we started getting this idea of what we wanted. My big thing was having a big kitchen window."

One day, in 2004, their realtor called and told them about a farm that was about to be on the market.

"She said if we were even halfway interested we had to get this place," Bryant said. "We knew this was it."

Two years later they had sold their practice in southeastern North Carolina and were living full-time in their new Tennessee farmhouse (they used it as a vacation home for the first two years).

Golden Gaits Farm

The Mortons, who now have two children, Bart, 6, and Alex, 4, made some renovations to their historic home, which was built in the 1800s, built new barns and made a few other changes to their farm. They named their new haven Golden Gaits Farm.

Together, they operate a breeding facility and enjoy their many horses, including spotted saddle, walking horses, Friesians and curly horses (a rare and hypoallergenic breed of horses).

Additionally, Bryant performs relief work about three to four days a week for veterinarians across the region.

Wendy works at her dream job everyday -- the farm -- in addition to being a mom, cook, house cleaner and chauffeur. Furthermore, the Mortons have begun growing grapes and hope to have their own little vineyard one day.

All in all, the Mortons' dream to enjoy the best out of life has come true. And they wouldn't want to do it anywhere else.

"I just love the people, the landscaping, everything," Bryant said. "The people here are just wonderful."