Anders Lindgren was a former cavalry officer and accomplished rider. He won the 1971 Swedish Dressage Championship, and was the reserve rider on the Swedish Olympic Team in 1972. He also won the Scandinavian Eventing Championship in 1959. Lindgren was the first inductee into the USDF Hall of Fame in recognition of his seminal training of U.S. Dressage instructors. Over a ten-year period, almost 1000 participating instructors learned from his systematic, structured approach to teaching dressage at the USDF Violet Hopkins National Seminars. He was an early proponent of the USDF Instructor Certification Program, and his work laid the foundation for this program.

Major Lindgren first entered the world of U.S. Dressage in 1981 when Colonel Aage Sommer brought him to Violet Hopkins’ farm in Michigan for the first USDF National Instructors Seminar. Hundreds of professional and amateur dressage instructors and students have benefited from Lindgren’s teaching. His students have competed successfully nationally and internationally at the FEI levels, and include Lilo Fore, Alexsandra Howard, and Kyra Kyrklund. Lindgren served as Finnish team trainer in the 1970s. He lived in the United States from 1981 to the early 1990s, when he moved back to Sweden.