Without Leslie Easterwood, MA, DVM, and the Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Science’s Large Animal Hospital (LAH), the success story of one horse and a 10-year-old girl named Codybelle wouldn’t have happened.

“Charley is one of those horses we run across every now and then that’s just different,” Terry Smith said of Charley. “He definitely has some quirks, but with those come extraordinary abilities that you don’t see too often.”

Charley, who belonged to Smith’s brother-in-law at the time, badly injured his eye in the pasture one day. With the eye in terrible condition and a fear that vision might be lost, Smith and his brother loaded Charley up in the trailer and took him to a veterinarian in Seguin, Texas.

“When we originally took him to the veterinarian in Seguin, he said they would need to take the eyeball out,” Smith said. “It was in really bad condition and they didn’t think they could save it When I asked what other options we had, the veterinarian said to take him to Dr. Easterwood at Texas A&M