Hundreds of viewers of a June 8 segment on CBS Evening News with Katie Couric featuring the Kentucky-based stallion retirement facility Old Friends have responded by opening their hearts and wallets.

Old Friends volunteer Ruthann von den Burg said when she arrived at the facility the morning after the broadcast and checked telephone messages, several were from people offering material and financial support, including an equine dentist in California.

“Some of these people were crying,” von den Burg said. “They didn’t know what happens to these horses.”

In the three-minute segment, CBS news correspondent Richard Schlesinger told viewers about the fate that could await former racehorses and stallions when their careers are over. But he and producer Chloe Arensburg also managed to capture footage of Old Friends retiree Popcorn Deelites, one of several Thoroughbreds to play Seabiscuit in the Academy Award-nominated movie, romping in a paddock on a near cloudless spring day with West Coast star Special Ring