Joe McSpadden '78

In the 8th grade, Joe’s drama teacher (Randy Bonifay), read to the class Philip Caputo’s classic biography of his experiences as a Marine officer in 1965 Vietnam. This, along with his father’s recounting of his own experiences as a Lieutenant in the Army, lead to Joe’s lifelong love of history and interest in military affairs.

Joe left Texas for Connecticut and the Kent School where he discovered there really are four seasons and other sports besides football. Graduating from Kent in 1981, Joe eagerly returned to Texas to attend SMU and earned degrees in political science and communications in 1985. In 1984, Joe was hired to work at the 1984 Republican National Convention. He served as a communications director and in four congressional campaigns, in three states and over two election cycles in 1986 and 1988. During that period, Joe made a chapel talk at Trinity School about voting and being involved in the political process.

In 1989, Joe moved to Los Angeles and was fortunate to end up in the fabled William Morris mailroom. He worked for the worldwide head of the motion pictures department, mostly on the literary side of the business. Later, Joe worked for a major producer during the release of two studio movies. He was soon hired to work as a development executive for an Emmy-winning TV director at Warner Bros Television where he helped place four shows on four different networks.

In 2005, the US Army’s First Cav. Division contacted ROCK wanting to put some of their injured troops who were amputees at Brooke Army Medical Center safely on horseback. A pilot program was organized and Joe documented the program, filming over 19 hours of footage over the course of that summer.

The footage was then edited into two videos that have been used by the national umbrella organization PATH (Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship) to promote the idea of putting veterans as well as active duty soldiers on horseback to combat PTSD as well as traumatic brain injury. The original program called HORSES FOR HEROES is now known as Equine Services for Heroes. Currently, there are over 200 programs nationwide that have used Joe’s video as the basis for starting a veteran riding program. Joe has a daughter, Grace, who also has a love for horses.

Joe has participated in several Trinity Career Fairs, and stays active in the Trinity Alumni Association. Joe co-chaired the Coach Bill Coombes Endowment Campaign, joining forces with other alums to raise over $160,000 celebrating Coach Bill Coombes’ 40 years of service to Trinity School.