Lynn Boughton, age 13, of Tacoma, Wash., for her question:

IN WHICH COUNTRY DID HORSES ORIGINATE?

Countries are man made inventions that date back just a few thousand years. Scientists have traced the horse's family tree back through some 70 million years. Hence, the early horses must have originated long before there were any countries with man made boundaries. In fact, they were here long ages before the first human family arrived on the earth.

A hundred million years ago, giant dinosaurs lumbered around the earth and others swam in the seas. Here and there a few small mammals scurried around and managed to survive. We know these things as facts, because the fossilized bones of ancient animals were preserved in the earth's crust. Fossil records, dating back millions of years, have helped scientists to trace the age old history of the horse.

Some of these early horse fossils were found in North America, and for a while the experts thought that this is where the horse family originated. However, such fossil remains also have been found in South America, Europe, Asia and Africa. In fact, the ancestral horses were very plentiful on all continents except Antarctica and Australia.

Nobody knows for certain where the family originated. But it certainly got its start long ages before people invented countries. However, for reasons unknown, perhaps a million years ago the horses disappeared from the American continents. Modern horses and their pony kinfolk are descended from ancestors that survived in other parts of the world.

Our early human ancestors hunted little wild horses for food. During the past 4,000 years or so, they tamed them and developed superior strains. However, nature had been improving the horse family for about 70 million years. Amazing as it may seem, the original horses were no bigger than hares  and they ran around on soft little toes.

This long animal story has been traced step by step as fossils were found in older and still older rocks.  Gradually the original horses grew bigger and stronger, improved their teeth and one toe on each foot developed a hard toe for fast running. About a million years ago, they looked like the little wild horses that survive to this day. But by this time they had left the Americas.