A Marion County barn that was destroyed by fire, leading to the death of 21 horses inside, was owned by a well-known family that has purchased and developed hundreds of millions of dollars of property in Ocala and Marion County, including the World Equestrian Center and Golden Ocala Golf and Equestrian Club.
On Tuesday, Marion County Fire Rescue crews responded to calls of a fire along NW 118th Street Road in Reddick, just after 4 a.m.
Upon arrival, crews discovered a barn at the Roberts Quarter Horse Farm that was engulfed in flames. Crews took a couple minutes to reach the barn and observed that a roof had collapsed within the 10,000-square-foot structure.
Although firefighters were eventually able to extinguish the fire, 21 horses that were trapped inside the barn were all killed as a result of the blaze.
After the fire was extinguished at the barn on Tuesday, the Marion County Fire Marshall, along with personnel from the State of Florida Bureau of Fire, Arson and Explosives, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, began conducting an investigation into the cause of the blaze.
That investigation is ongoing and no further details have been made available by authorities.
Records from the Marion County Property Appraiser show that the Roberts Quarter Horse Farm is registered to Roberts Corporation. Mary Roberts and her late husband, Ralph Larry Roberts, Sr., built the farm decades ago to breed and train quarter horses. Roberts, Sr., passed away in 2023.
Over the years, the Roberts family has spent hundreds of millions of dollars developing various parts of Ocala and Marion County.
In 2021, the Roberts family celebrated the opening of the World Equestrian Center in Ocala. That billion-dollar facility is the largest equestrian center in the United States and is one of only two in existence in the country, joining another facility in Ohio that is also owned by the Roberts family.
The family also created the Golden Ocala Golf & Equestrian Club, a 1,200-acre private community with a bevy of luxurious homes.