It started out as a typical September morning. Lara McPherson was already at the barn on a horse, enjoying the crisp early fall morning on Long Island and admiring the bright blue sky.

But when she returned to the barn shortly after 9 a.m., one phone call changed everything–it was Sept. 11, 2001.

“I was out in a field riding a horse when the first plane hit the Trade Center,” she recalled. “I was in the barn office when a friend called to tell us to turn on the TV. We were watching when the second plane hit. And then we heard that another plane had crashed into the Pentagon. At that point I tried to call my dad’s office–he worked in the Pentagon.”

McPherson, a native of McLean, Va., just outside of Washington, D.C., spent five anxious hours waiting to hear whether her father, George McPherson, had escaped the burning building. At 2 p.m. she received the call that she’d hoped for–her father had made it out.

Those few hours McPherson spent glued to the TV changed the direction of her life. After the 9/11 attack, she spent 11 1/2 years in New York City working on a photographic memorial in SoHo called “Here Is New York.”

“I went there with a friend to volunteer just a few days after 9/11. I gave all my time and felt I couldn’t leave. At the time I was in between jobs, and then the gallery ended up hiring me,” she said. “I fell in love with New York City. I loved being in the city after being out in fields for so long.”

McPherson, a graphic designer, spent countless hours in front of the computer scanning and printing photos that people brought in of the 9/11 attacks, the aftermath and devastation of New York City.

The exhibit, which started with a few photos in front of a store in SoHo, morphed into more than 8,000 images and an 800-page book.

The projected was called “A Democracy of Photographs” because everyone who took photos relating to the tragedy was invited to submit their images to the gallery, where they were digitally scanned, printed and displayed on the walls alongside the work of top photojournalists and other professional photographers.

All of the prints that “Here Is New York” displayed were sold to the public for $25, regardless of their provenance. The net proceeds from the sale of these prints went to the Children’s Aid Society WTC Relief Fund, which raised more than $800,000.

The exhibit traveled to more than 20 galleries throughout the world, including Russia, Germany, Chicago and the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., for the anniversary. The exhibition was featured on the TV shows “Oprah” and “20/20,” and many other major media outlets picked up the story. The photographs are now archived with the New York Historical Society.

“Other than school, this was the only thing that fully pulled me away from horses,” said McPherson. “I felt because my father was in the Pentagon and with my background in art, that I was meant to be there. I thought about the horses while I was there, but I was so wrapped up in what I was doing that I couldn’t have left it.

“I think it’s good to leave something to see how much a part of life it really is, and if it does leave a void when it’s gone. It made me appreciate horses all the more,” she added. “I used to beat myself up saying, ‘I’ve got to get away from this?it’s just a sick hobby.’ Then one day I said, ‘But why would I want to leave something that I love so much? Why would I want to take that away?”

“After 9/11, you realize you shouldn’t cut things out of your life that you enjoy just because society tells you. You better enjoy each day to the fullest, and if it’s on the back of a horse, that’s where it should be.”

Today McPherson, 37, is back in the show ring and enjoying every minute. Aboard Susan Taylor’s Sensation, McPherson currently leads USEF Zone 3 in the adult amateur, 36 and over, division and qualified for the fall indoor shows, including the Washington Inter-national (D.C.), where she placed third in the WIHS Adult Hunter Championship.

The Passion For Ponies

McPherson grew up loving horses. Although her parents, Anita and George McPherson, weren’t interested in horses, they accommodated their eldest daughter by buying her a pony. But after that initial purchase, she was on her own. Lara and her younger sister, Courtney, trained with Dale Crittenberger and Peter Foley during their junior years, and Lara started catch-riding whatever ponies and horses they had in the barn.

“I rode anything that anybody had,” said McPherson.

Early on, McPherson learned that the best way to get her foot in the door was to become indispensable in the barn, so she perfected the arts of body clipping, braiding and grooming. Throughout high school, McPherson spent her weekends standing on a braiding ladder at night and riding and showing during the day, working for various barns.

But when it came time to go to college, McPherson didn’t hesitate. She attended Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond and earned her bachelor’s degree in communication arts and design in 1989. After putting showing on hold for a few semesters, the gang at Rolling Acres in Brookeville, Md., reeled her back in with the offer to show a nice adult hunter named Justin Tyme.

“Patty Foster put me on a horse at Culpeper [Va.] one weekend, and I was reserve champion. Then the bug had bit again. It all came back,” she said, laughing. “It was terrifying to be back in the ring again, but at the same time it was a wonderful feeling.”

From then on, McPherson balanced school with riding and spent most weekends at the shows. After graduation, she and her mother, also a graphic designer, started a business.

“I was always into art–I’m a visual person. That’s why the horses and showing is so perfect–it’s all visual,” she said.

After a few years, McPherson felt a familiar tug–school was calling her back. So she entered Georgetown University (D.C.) in 1996 for her master’s degree in liberal studies with a minor in photography. She skipped the first few spring semesters to devote to riding and showing, attending school in the fall only, but even that required a juggling act.

During the mid-1990s, McPherson and the venerable “Fritz And Bill” were hard to beat in the adult hunter and equitation divisions. And aboard the bay Thoroughbred owned by Crittenberger, McPherson won the 1997 Ariat Adult Medal Finals at Capital Challenge and the Virginia and Maryland Horse Shows Association Medal finals during that time period.

“One year I had to beg one of my professors to let me go to the Meadowlands [N.J.] to show,” she recalled. “He didn’t understand what would be so important to miss his class. During Capital Challenge [Md.] I’d have to ride my horse and then drive back to Georgetown across the river to go to class.

“So it got a little hectic at times, but I couldn’t give up the riding. I had Fritz And Bill at the time. When you get Fritz And Bill’s reins, you don’t want to give them away.”

In 1999 she logged thousands of frequent-flier miles traveling back and forth from Washington to Florida to finish her last semester. “It was hard. But I loved school so much that I wanted to stretch it out forever,” she said.

During this time McPherson also stretched her wings and traveled around the country to different shows, working for different trainers and taking catch-rides. She found herself in Gulfport, Miss., and Indio, Calif., before returning east for the summers and settling on Long Island, where she worked for several barns and became involved with the Hampton Classic Horse Show.

She was riding at Bobby Ginsberg’s Rosewood Farm in Bridgehampton, N.Y., that fateful day in 2001.

Sensational Times

Leaving New York after the “Here Is New York” exhibition concluded wasn’t hard for McPherson because she had old friends waiting for her. She still misses living in New York City, but she said returning to Virginia to pick up the reins again in 2003 felt like the right thing to do–and she’s never regretted it.

“When the project came to an end, I realized what I needed to do,” she said. “I went home.”

Miranda Scott, a childhood friend and fellow student of Crittenberger and Foley, had taken up training duties at Meadowbrook Stables in Chevy Chase, Md., and the two joined forces once again.

“After the 9/11 project was over, I convinced her to come back,” said Scott. “I had Sensation at the time. But Lara agreed to come to Florida–only to braid, not to ride.”

Sensation, a gray Thoroughbred, was just starting his pre-green year under Scott’s guidance. While in Ocala, Fla., Scott convinced McPherson to get back into the saddle after some fancy footwork.

“He was jumping me out of the tack. In fact, during the first week [of HITS Ocala] he jumped my helmet right off my head, and I caught it in the air and kept going,” said Scott with a laugh. “I realized then, after my trick riding, that he needed to go around the ring a few more times. So Lara found her match.”

The two immediately clicked, and the adult amateur tricolors started rolling in. Among their successes were the Upperville (Va.) grand championship and hunter classic victory, championships at Culpeper (Va.), Roanoke (Va.) and the Middleburg Classic (Va.).

McPherson took a position with Meadowbrook as their show coordinator and continues to braid to help pay the bills. In addition, she keeps her hand in the graphic design world by taking freelance assignments.

“My ideal is when I can pull the two worlds together. I always keep my ears open for new opportunities and interesting jobs,” said McPherson, who designed the logo for the new Horse Shows By The Bay in Michigan. “I really feel that I want to put the two worlds together because that’s me. I can do both. I don’t see myself leaving again.”

After Taylor agreed to keep Sensation, nicknamed Toby, in the adult ring another year, McPherson spent 2004 achieving goals she never thought possible. They earned a second Upperville grand championship, won the Zone 3 Finals (Md.), the WCHR Mid-Atlantic reserve champion and adult amateur title and will finish as Maryland Horse Shows Association champion and Virginia Horse Show Association reserve champion.

“It’s nice for her. I don’t think she’s ever shown a horse for this long of a time,” said Scott. “I know that this has been really special for her. She knows Toby inside and out. If he twitches an eyebrow wrong, she knows. She’s very intuitive and in tune with him. To keep showing him this year has allowed her to realize many dreams.”

Still, McPherson said that the ribbons aren’t as important as the lessons she’s learned outside the ring.

“You build a family at the shows, and you don’t want to give up the people that you meet,” she added. “There’s nothing like having a great horse and working with one of your best friends. I couldn’t leave it again if I tried. You’re all trying to achieve the same thing in a sense–to build your life around horses.”