Lexington, KY - Central Avenue resident Jack DuArte likes to say he’s the most aptly named guy in the world –– “I’m a jack of all trades, but I’m not sure I’m a master of any of them.”
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Originally from New Orleans, DuArte studied journalism at the University of Kentucky in the 1960s. To get himself through school, he worked for the local radio station WVLK; in fact, he credits driving that station’s mobile unit around town with helping him really get to know the city. After college, however, he moved away from Lexington for decades before returning in 2001 –– his exploits and adventures during that time included traveling to Vietnam with the Air Force for the war before being stationed in Cape Cod; owning a restaurant in New Orleans with a kitchen led by celebrity chef Paul Prudhomme (who was at the time relatively unknown); owning a handful of small wineries in Napa Valley and handling foreign relations for Robert Mondavi Wines; and serving as the executive director for the Thoroughbred Breeders Association of New Jersey.
While it’s an impressive list of accomplishments, perhaps the item of interest most familiar to Chevy Chase residents is the miniature Falabella pony, Darleigh, who lives most of the year in the Central Avenue backyard of DuArte and his wife, Susan. Darleigh is currently boarding at a nearby farm –– where she stays for a couple months each winter to give the DuArte’s backyard grass a chance to replenish –– but nearly every day during the rest of the year, DuArte can be seen walking her to Woodland Park to graze.
“There’s a whole stand of clover and bluegrass mix,” he said of the park’s nutritional offerings. “She loves it.”
Just 29 inches tall at the withers (the small ridge between the shoulder blades that’s commonly used in measuring the height of a horse), Darleigh is small even by miniature standards. Susan, who grew up with horses –– her father was the first commercial breeder of Falabellas in the United States –– had pushed for the couple to get a horse when they first married, but DuArte resisted for years.
“In the beginning I didn’t even want to hear about it,” he recalled with a laugh. Finally, Susan convinced him to go visit some friends of hers who had miniature horses. Seeing Darleigh for the first time was all the convincing he needed.
“As soon as I saw her, I said OK,” he said about the horse. While the horse may have started out as his wife’s pet, DuArte has established an unbreakable bond with Darleigh, who recently turned 8 years old –– Falabellas often live to be 30 or 35.
“I’m the one who always lets her in the house,” he admits. “It’s hard for me to leave her.”
Despite his unmistakeable presence in the community as “the guy with the little horse,” DuArte has been gaining recognition for another feat in recent years –– he is currently preparing to embark on a book tour for the third novel in his World War II series, “Spitfire,” which has been gaining a considerable number of readers on Kindle despite DuArte’s minimal promotional efforts. The book, which uses the Battle of Britain in the early ‘40s as a backdrop, is also available at several local bookstores and on Amazon.com.
Having been born right before WWII started, DuArte said he has long had a fascination with that period of history; he puts painstaking research into the history and tries to use characters who actually existed when possible.
“I’ve always thought that period was the most intriguing because the balance of power hung by a thread,” he said, “and a very thin thread at that.”
Despite DuArte’s varied travels, he says there’s no place he’d rather be right now than Lexington. He admits that his decision to move back might have been at least partially influenced by the positive experience he had during his college years, but says that the community elements of Chevy Chase are of incomparable value.
“I have a feeling that for many people, myself included, the college experience was the premier experience of their life, and their relation to that particular era never leaves,” he said. “But when we go out walking, with the dogs or with Darleigh, there will probably be 10 people that we’ll pass and they’ll all say hello. That doesn’t happen anywhere else.
“The quality of life is so spectacular. Lexington is a little big city,” he continued. “It’s got just enough of the quality aspects of life to be great, but it’s not too big, and I don’t know if it’ll ever be too big.”http://chevychaser.com/