Leeanne Meadows Ladin has been writing and riding horses all her life. She learned how to ride, bareback and barefoot, on pinto ponies at her grandparents' farm in southwest Virginia. At age ten, she spent all her birthday money on The Fireside Book of Horse Racing & 013; A Thoroughbred Treasury, never dreaming that decades later she would co-author a book about the greatest Thoroughbred of all.& ;& ; Leeanne owns Free Rein Writing, which she founded on her former horse farm. In addition to Secretariat& 019;s Meadow, she has written four books of regional historical interest, including the award-winning The State Fair of Virginia & 013; More Than A Midway, which featured a chapter on The Meadow. Today she writes a blog about her author adventures on the & 01C;Barnstorming Book Tour& 01D; for Secretariat& 019;s Meadow and also hosts a Blog Talk radio show called Free Rein Radio. Leeanne has a B.S.

in journalism from Virginia Commonwealth University and is a member of James River Writers.