On a Saturday afternoon in mid-October, the pastures off Young Road in Gilford will fill with the crack of blank cartridges and the drum of hooves — a spectacle that most people in the Lakes Region have never seen in person, staged in memory of a 15-year-old girl who loved it more than almost anything.
The third annual Be A Syd Project Farm Day runs Saturday, Oct. 17 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 26 Young Road in Gilford. The event is free and open to the public, and its centerpiece is a Cowboy Mounted Shooting exhibition hosted by the Bay State Bandits, the only club of its kind in Massachusetts.
The day unfolds in stages. Western riding demonstrations begin at 11 a.m., followed at noon by Barrels and Poles games — the timed, weaving speed events familiar to anyone who has spent time around a riding ring. From 1 to 4 p.m., the mounted shooting takes over. The organization's own listing also promises food and vintage vehicles on display, and its mission page describes the broader aim: raising money to fund the training and expenses required to eventually offer equine therapy to community members who could benefit from it.
For the uninitiated, Cowboy Mounted Shooting looks like a collision of two sports that were never meant to share an arena: barrel racing and Old West sharpshooting. Riders navigate a course of cones and barrels while firing two .45-caliber single-action revolvers — the kind of gun that has to be cocked by hand before every shot, just as it was in the late 1800s. The ammunition is blank, but it carries enough force to burst balloons from as far as 20 feet away, which is what makes the sport safe for spectators and genuinely difficult for riders. Competitors are scored on both time and accuracy, and penalties are assessed for missing a target, dropping a gun, or falling off the horse.
The Bay State Bandits were established in 2022 and have grown quickly, hosting events including their Quick or Dead match, the Massachusetts State Championship, and clinics that take riders from beginner to advanced. The club notes that anyone over 13 with a Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association membership and a beginner safety clinic under their belt can compete, while riders 12 and under serve as "wranglers," running the courses with cap or toy guns.
That the exhibition lands in Gilford is no accident. The sport has deep roots here. The Northeast Six-Shooters, the regional club affiliated with the national Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association, has held events at the Lakes Region Riding Academy for years, drawing members from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. The club traces its origins to 2005, when it began in Massachusetts as the MA Six Shooters; it took its current name in 2011 when New Hampshire's Dina Baratta became president. Its members dress in Western costume and describe their purpose as promoting "cowboy heritage through competition, costume & camaraderie, focusing on safety, friends & fun."
Sydnie Quimby was a member of that club. Born in Laconia on Sept. 3, 2007, she was a dedicated honor student at Gilford High School who played J.V. soccer and softball, danced, and sang. But her true passion lived outdoors. She was a fixture on the slopes at Gunstock, counting down to opening day each winter, and she was a remarkable horseback rider who trained a headstrong little black horse named Mercy entirely on her own. Together, the pair earned two state championship titles — one in New Hampshire and one in Vermont — in mounted shooting. The Be A Syd Project's remembrance describes them as "a horse and rider team that looked as though they were one unit, beautifully floating together."
On Jan. 16, 2023, Sydnie died after a skiing accident at Gunstock Mountain Resort. Witnesses told officials she skied off the Derringer trail and struck rocks and trees; she was wearing a helmet, was comforted by members of the skiing public until the ski patrol arrived, and was transported by the Gilford Fire Department to Concord Hospital–Laconia before being transferred to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, where she died. Gilford High School principal Anthony Sperazzo informed the school community the following day. "This is a sad loss for our community," he wrote. Gunstock's president and general manager, Tom Day, said in a statement that the resort's "hearts go out to her family at this difficult time."
What followed was an effort to turn that loss into something that looked like Sydnie. The Be A Syd Project was founded by her grandparents, Judy and Scott Ellis, who shared her love of horses and for whom riding was a special bond with their granddaughter. The nonprofit, now a 501(c)(3) based in Gilford, is led by president Koleen Crawford and a board of family members and friends, and its stated mission is "creating a safe place for horses and humans to experience kindness, hope, and healing."
The organization's philosophy extends past the people it serves to the animals themselves. Its mission statement argues that horses, no longer a necessity for transportation or daily work, "deserve to step down from that responsibility into a life of comfort and joy" — and that when they are given that, "they will give back to us in unimaginable ways." That belief is the through-line of Farm Day, which in past years has featured horse events, games, food, and even mechanical bull riding. The 2025 edition was held Oct. 4; this year's returns to mid-October.
There is another layer to the story. The Northeast Six-Shooters have donated proceeds from their own events to the project, including a "Live Like Syd Day" held at the Lakes Region Riding Academy. The academy itself, at 26 Young Road, is marking its 30th year. Founder Julie Lawrence, who first fell for horses on the pony rides at Forest Park in Springfield, Massachusetts, built the program around safety and horsemanship "from the ground up," and has operated from the Young Road property since 2005. It is the kind of barn that calls itself a "Barn-family" — which is precisely the setting the project was looking for.
The source article notes that Sydnie was quick to jump off her horse and run beside a young child so they could win a ribbon — humble, always thinking of others. It is a small detail, but it explains the shape of the day: a free, open farm where anyone can wander in, watch horses work, and see a sport most have only read about. More information is available at beasydproject.org.