June 19, 2013 — Today Fergus The Horse reaches 60,000+ followers on Facebook. Fergus began on Facebook in March of 2012. Two days before his one-year anniversary, March 11th, Fergus welcomed his 50,000th follower. Now he is 10,000 beyond that, and still growing.
“The greatest fun,” says artist/author Jean Abernethy, “is the comments that come back from equestrians around the world. They are horse people to the core, and so they really relate to this humor.”
Fergus is the little bay horse who has rewritten Renee Descartes’ famous philosophical quote to make it a more logical concept for equines: “I spook first, then I think later, therefore I am.”
Within his first year on Facebook, Fergus enjoyed an on-line chat interview with character DJ Neigh, an Equestrian Social Media Award-winning on-line radio channel, Neigh-Bors. Fergus himself became a finalist in the 2013 ESMA’s category for “Best Talking Animal.” Fergus also turned up in a guest blog written by artist/author Jean Abernethy, and published on Angela Walkup’s HorseGirlTV website.
In the early winter of 2013, Fergus’ Bucked-off Snowman comic strip raced around the world, raising the bar in numbers of viewers. Fans were building snow horses and bucked-off snow riders across Europe and North America, submitting their photos to post on Fergus’ page. The snow sculptures themselves were hilarious, attracting even more viewers.
Fergus comic strips are available to commercial publications, or for private use on-line or in print. Visit www.fergusthehorse.com for more information.
Artist Jean Abernethy also does custom cartooning and illustration, both comical and instructional. She provided illustration for Peter Leone’s Show Jumping Clinic by Peter Leone & Kim Jaussi (Storey Publishing); Polo For The 21st Century, by Rege Ludwig; Simple Solutions Series (BowTie Press); and From My Hands to Yours by Monty Roberts. Her work also appears each month in the Borrow A Trainer column in The American Quarter Horse Journal.
To see more of Jeans work, visit www.JeanAbernethy.com.
