Missouri achieved statehood in 1821 and the pioneers who streamed across the Mississippi River to settle in the Ozarks cam mostly from the vhills and plantations of Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia. They brought with them their finest possessions, including their best saddle stock. The breeding of this stock was largely Arabian, Morgan and plantation horses from the deep south. Later more American Saddlebred, Tennessee Walking and Standardbred breeding was added. It soon became apparent that horses able to perform the easy, broken gait called the "fox trot" were the most useful in the rocky, forest-covered hills of the Ozarks, and selective breeding of the fox trot gait began.

Easy-gaited stock imported to America's shores during the colonial era left its genetic imprint on the fox-trotting horse in the Ozarks, the American Saddle Horses of Kentucky and the walking horses of Tennessee. Some nineteenth century greats, such as the Canadian stallion, Tom Hal, made sizeable contributions to the easy-gaited horses of all three regions.