Transcription
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WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1920 THE HORSE REVIEW 1223
Harnbletonian 10 and 'His 'Monument
By VOLUNTEER
Beauty and nobility were, f ro m time immemo-
rial, the sovereign qualities or characters of the
h orse-e=a.n d we must remember that it is from
these same breeds which so fired the imaginations
of the oreeks, the Egyptians and the Assyrians that
our best modern ones descend. If the poets and
artists of the antique world were transported by
the equine race as they knew. it, what would be
their sentiments today, if confronted by the best
modern specimens? The horses they knew were
mere ponies, which, it is believed, seldom exceeded
thirteen hands in height. Certainly their emotions
would have been still more enthusiastic had they
known, or even conceive·l of the magnificent creat-
ures of the twentieth century, giants in comparison
with \.their ancestors of over two thousand years
ago.
I have ransacked the literatures of all lands
and times for passages descriptive of the horse, and
I N EVERY horseman's life there con:ie s
olemn
_
moments. A "turf career" is not ordmanl
_y as-
sociated with anything but ideas of exh llar'a-
tion• "sport"
-and the turf is the greatest of all
i,por'ts!-being in itself synonymous. with, the pur-
suit of a good time, of pleasure for its o,, n sake
red-blooded pleasure, which thrills the whole hu-
man animal and causes him to forget dull care
driving, fo
_
r' at least the moment, .all grav:
thoughts away. But it is an old, old story that be
neath all the gayety in this world there 1s a_ founda-
tion- of sobriety to which, when our enthusiasm has
subsided, there is an inevitable ret~r~
. W~ al~
ways must "come down to earth again arter our
airy flights into the empyrean-or as near.
~here
as we can get, whether by aeroplane or ot
herw1se:--
_
and to a sense of those realities upon which ever Y-
thing is based. And in our deeper m
_
o~ents w~ pay
tribute to these great underlying principles o1 ele-
ments which, as the poet well
has s~id, provolrn within_ our /
breasts "thoughts that do l ie too
deep for speech." .
Something of this k in d
passed tnr ouxn my mind, neb-
lou'sl" but pervasively, one
u , • I stood
morning last August as .
for the first time, with bared
h ad before the monument. to
e d' 1., I-Iambletonian which
Rys y, s .
towers above his grave in the
little village of Chester, Orange
county, New Yorlc How ma~y
times in imagination I had vis-
ited this spot! And now, at last,
1 stood there, in the flesh. From
my earliest recollection the
names of Hambletonian, Ches-
ter and Orange county had been
"familiar on my lips as house-
hold words." Yet fate had willed
that I should pass the half-cen-
tury milestone, with the gray
hairs getting ever thicker in my
thatch, before I should be per-
mitted to visit this hallowed
spot.
It is impossible-quite im-
possible-for me to put into
words the feeling of reverence
which possesses me for the
name and fame, the memory
and the greatness, of Hamble-
tonian. The ancient Greeks,
searching for the symbol which
should most fitly characterize
man's highest aspirations, chose
that of Pegasus, the winged
horse, typical of the spirit of
poetry, in which those aspira-
tions take their highest form.
Plato, greatest of the Greek
philosophers, allegorized the
human soul under the figure of
two horses hitched to a chariot,
one representing the spiritual,
the other the animal nature of
man, which, under the guidance
of his reason, must work har-
moniously together, each keep-
ing pace with the other in their
onward, upward' course. In the
Iliad of Homer, the horses of
Achilles foretold the hero's
death, being suddenly gifted
with speech for that purpose-
and if the reader happens to visit Boston next sum-
mer, for the Readviile Grand Circuit meeting, he
will, if he seeks it out, find there, in the Athenaeum,
one of the most magnificent of all horse pictures,
the great painting of: "Automedon Wi th the Horses
of Achilles," by Henri Regnault.
In the mind of the antique world, the horse
was always clothed with godlike attributes. His
form was sculptured by Phidias on the frieze of the
Parthenon, it ornamented the temples of the Egyp-
tians at Karnak and Luxor, and those of the As-
syrians and Babylonians in the valley of the Eu-
phrates. These were the cradles of modern civili-
zation, from which its most enduring forces took
their rise. Yet again, as the frozen north gradu-
ally awoke from the lethargy of the glaciers which
enveloped it, and the currents of life flowed through
and took possession of it, its earliest inhabitants
capable of rising to religious conceptions which
they could body forth, seized upon the horse as
something more than earthly, which they associated
with. their gods and placed in their heavens. To
the· redskins of primeval America he was unknown
until the
_
Spanish "conquistadores" brought him to
their shores, when at once he tool, his place in
their my tho log'Ies and was endowed with super-
natural powers.
The Monument to Hambletonian 10 at Chester, N. Y.
read all the poets and romancers who have intro-
duced him into their wo rks, and in the course of
these prolonged literary wanderings I have encoun-
tered, and tried to figure to myself, all the famous
horses of song and story, of history and record, as
they were or might have been. Glorious and won-
derful figures they are, haloed by the bright hues
of fancy and glamour of great achievement. But
all of them shrink into insignificance when, in my
mind's eye, I place them beside Hambletonian.
About him there is truly, to me, something godlike,
as the ancients thought of their worshipped steeds.
My feeling for him approaches that of religious
veneration, and my thought of him is tinged with
a reverence instinctive and profound.
* • * I
Hambletonian, I do not suppose, was under any
circumstances to be considered beautiful. He p os-:
sessed certain beautiful physical characters-no-
tably his rich, lustrous, deep bay coat, his fine eye,
his sweeping tail, his massive muscular structure,
his cordy, sinewy limbs. Moreover, in action he
displayed. a singular ease and buoyancy of move-
ment. his tread being quick and catlike, and his
stroke, they say, at speed, superb. But merely as
one looked at him, he did not, in the old phrase,
"handsome much." His head was heavy arid un-
refined, his neck short and "out of drawing," his
entire ensemble Jacking in classic grace of propor-
tion. But he cilid impress any one who studied him
or staid about him with an everpowering sense of
nobility. Probably a more perfectly tempered horse
never lived. As is well known, when he died the
box stall in which he had spent so many years was
without mark of heel or tooth at any spot or place,
its woodwork being as perfectly preserved as if
never exposed to possibility of blemish. He had an
indwelling dignity and majesty that were, to many
men, almost supernatural in their quiet grandeur.
A great brain, a great heart, a great nature-these
things pre-eminently were his. He had come into
the world endowed with them, he revealed them
from the beginning, so much so that while still
young and urik no wn he had already Im-b ued a circle
of devotees with the feeling that he was a super-
, horse
life he effortlf'sslv a nrl wtt ho ut
ostentation "played the part"
-
or rather, lived it, for there was
n~ slightest taint of the facti-
tious about him, everything be-
ing intrinsic and unalloyed.
When his monument was
being erected, and the question
of an inscription came up, Mr.
Hamilton Busbey came forward
with one which, owing to the
criticism that it evoked, was not
cut in the gr'anite. I remember
that I was myself one of those
who united in its rejection on
the ground that it was high-
flown, grandiloquent and entire-
ly unsuitable. As I recall it,
Mr. Busbeys epitaph ran as fol-
lows:
"HIS NOBLENESS WAS THE
ACT OF INHERENT POWER"
Time changes our point of
view in many things. I still
tb Ink this epitaph inadequate
and the shaft more dignified
wttho u t it. But I do recognize
that in formulating it Mr. Bus-
hey was moved by a sincere and
att.og ct her worthy impulse
prompting him to the endeavor
to express, in as few words as
possible, the pre-eminent attri-
bute of the dead progenitor-
the nobility of his greatness. It
would have taken a Shakespeare
to do this, and one was not at
hand. Even had there been, he
might have failed.
::: *
As I say, I stood long be-
f9re the monument to Hamble-
ton tan that August morning,
with some such thoughts · as
those I have tried to express
ar-ove thronging through my
mind. As I gazed around at my
environment, too, I ruminated
upon the inexplicable forms and
channels through which great-
ness exerts its power. Here was
a little village, nestling in the
hills and vales of Orange
county, of, I imagine, less than
two t.h ou sa.n d souls-just a lit-
• tle country town, of that leisure-
ly, secluded atmosphere which wraps so many iu
the olcler part of "the East"
-the only at all old
part of our country. To any one casually riding
or driving th roug h it, there was absolutely noth-
ing about it to suggest for a moment anything at
all out of the ordinary. Peculiarly was this so be-
cause the monument to Hambletonian, which
otherwise might attracJ general attention, is tucked
away in a spot that, unless sought for, is not seen.
It is upon a hill and back upon a short side street,
and stands directiy between two unpretentious
frame houses, as the accompanying engraving
shows. T'h is engraving is from a photo taken five
years ago by "Marque," expressly for the REVIKW,
and since that time the iron railing w h i e h sur-
rounded the shaft has been removed-for what rea-
son I am not aware-ancl it stands, as it were, in
the clear. Even the two so-near houses cannot
spoil its dignity, yet it is a pity that they are there,
for they do not belong in such an ensemble as
this monument demands. There has lately been
an a.g+ta.ttr-u in Chester, J am told, for 'the .
----v. ul
of the shaft to a conspicuous and comrna n.tj ng site,
where it would be seen by everybody entering or
leaving the village. But this, to my mind, would
be a mistake. In the earth beneath it, the re-
mains of the great progenitor were interred and
1224
THE HORSE REVIEVI WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1920
above those remains Is Its proper stte,
What should be done Is this-the two en-
croaching houses should be removed, the ground
upon which they stand be purchased and parked,
and the entire space dedicated perpetually to the
memory of the mighty dead which it enshrines.
The cost of carrying out this plan would not be
great-a few thousands of dollars at most-and
could be easily raised if anybody of initiative and
energy set about it. All that would be necessary
would be to ask, say, each member of the Orange
County, Grand and other circuits, to. give a certain
percentage of their gate receipts upon a certain
day; or to hold a series of benefit matinees at var i-
ous tracks during the racing season. And there
are many other sources which might be utilized as
contributory to the purpose. Its realization would
prove that sentiment Is not dead in the trotting
world, and the tribute would be one it were a plat-
itude to denominate richly deserved-for, if the de-
scendants of Hambletonlan were to be blotted out,
the sport of harness racing in America would per-
ish, as there are probably not a hundred horses
among the thousands of trotters and pacers raced
the past year which do not carry his blood.
The mention of this subject brings me to an-
other one, germane to it, that was really t'he germ
from which the present article sprang. In exam-
ining the contents of one of the pigeon-holes in
my desk not long ago, I came upon a folder, some-
what creased and yellowed, but still intact, which
bore the title: "Report of the National Association
of Trotting Horse Breeders on the Hambletonian
Monument Fund." Thi,s report consisted of the
final accounting, made public after the formal erec-
tion and unveiling of the shaft, giving the com-
plete list of donors to the fund, the amounts sub-
scribed by each and all, and the manner of dis-
bursement. It bears the date of May 1, 1893, and
owing to its historic interest, has been reproduced
in facimlle, by the engraver, and is herewith pre-
sented.
According to this report, which is official and
authentic, the grand total of persons and organ-
izations which contributed to the Monument Fund
was eighty-one, of which all but two were either
individual horsemen or firms composed of two or
three members. The National Association of Trot-
ting Horse Breeders, which had charge of the rais-
ing of the fund, itself contributed $250, being, with
one exception, the largest contributor. The excep-
tion referred to was Senator Leland Stanford, of
California, proprietor of Palo Alto Farm, then at
the height of its glory, who sent a c h ack for $500
-a characteristic example of his unfailing liber-
ality and public spirit in every enterprise in which
his interest was enlisted. It is to be recorded that
his original check was for $100, but when it be-
came necessary to swell the sum total to a larger
amount than had been raised after. subscriptions
seemed to be all in, he raised it to $500.
Only one other subscriber gave a three-figure
sum, that one having been John H. Wal1ace, who
is credited with $100. When one stops to consider
that while the "Great Compiler," the creator of the
Trotting Register and Year Book, of the Trottint::
Standard, and of "Wallace's Monthly," while he
had amassed a handsome competence from them,
was not, in worldly wealth, in any way the equal
of many of the other subscribers, one must admit
that beneath the brusque personality of this sin-
gular man there beat a heart responsive to what
he recognized as supreme greatness in the sphere
to which his life's labors had been dedicated.
Five different men and one organization gave
$50 each, these being, as they appear on the ros-
ter:-Edwin Thorne, proprietor of Thornedale, in
Dutchess county, N. Y., at that era, as it had been
for twenty years, one of the leading breeding es-
tablishments of the Empire State; W. J. Gordon,
of Cleveland, 0., then prominent as the owner ,or
Clingstone 2: 14, Guy. 2: 0 9 3/i, and other stars of the
high-wheel days, one of the leading members of the
Cleveland Driving Club, which held its meetings
at the famous old Glenville track, and a breeder, on
a small scale, at his Gordon Glen farm; William
Rocl,efeller, of the Standard Oil Co., who main-
tained a large stable of matinee horses at Cleve-
land; A. J. Alexander, proprietor of Woodburn
Farm, the most famous of Kentucky·s speed nur-
series; Charles Backman, proprietor of historic
Stony Ford Farm, In Orange county; and the New
Jersey Association of Trotting Horse Breeders. The
list of donors of $25 each is too long for ea.ch of
its members to be particularized about.
The roster of contributors is composed chiefly
of breeders; of Orange county horsemen, who,
through local pride and honor of the horse. thv.t
had brought, in the aggregate, millions of dollars
Into their locality,
"came across"; a few Ken-
tuckians, and scattering representatives of other
parts of the country. It may be· said in passing
that the list would have been more country-wide in
character but for the fact that the National Asso-
ciation of Trotting Horse Breeders was conducting
the collection and disburse,ment of the fund. This
organization was localized in New York City, was
composed almost exclusively of members identified
with that part of the country, and was dominated
by a group of officials who had managed to stir up
a good deal of antagonism outside their own balll-
.
·1<
REPORT
OF THE
National Association of Trotting Horse Breeders
ON TH.E
HAMBLETONIAN MONUMENT FUND.
'I'o subscriptions received from
tollowine. viz.:
Edwin Thorne $50 00
W. J. Gordon- . . . . . . .. . . . . . .. . . . . • 50 00
B. J. Treacy....................... 10·00
W. Rockefeller.................... 50 00
A. J. Alexander oO 00
J. H. Fenton.................... 10 00
R. P. Pepper . . . . • . .. . .. . . .. .. . .. 10 00
G. B. Goodell... . . . .. . .. . .. . . .. . .. 10 00
H. C. M.cDowell.. . . .. . .. . . . . .. • .. 25 00
Pharles Backman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 00
J. Carpenter........... . .. . . . . . 1 00
G. A. Chambers ,...... 1 00
John H .. Wallace 100 00
A. B. Hankins .'............. 1 00
Robert Steel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 00
W. F. Redmond 25 00
A.H. Gilbert ,............. 1 00.
B. K .. Johnson................... 5 00
Guy Miller , .. .. . . . .. . . .. . . . 25 00
7,. E. Simmons :..... 10 00
E. H. BrQdbead.................. 2:3 00
D. J. Campau..................... 10 00
Geo. B. James : .. ,10 00
Carl S. Burr....................... 10 00
Rev. T. A. Hendricks,
·•Aurelius" 5 00
G. Conklin :............. 3 00
W. B. Dorwin..................... 2 00
J.C. Howland 25· 00
Harrison Mills..................... 10 00
.Jobn E. Wood .. . .. . .. . .. .. . . .. .. 5 00
H. A. Pooler , :.......... 10 00
H.P. Clauson..................... 5 00
J. Blackburn Miller............... 10 00
'r. S. Durland............ . . . . . . . . . 5 00
S. B. Hill : ._...... 5 00
Masterson Bros.. . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . 5 00
.T. C. Hoyt .' ·
..... 5 00
W. S. Jayne.... .. . .. . . . .. .. . .. . 5_ 00
Elbert Kipp ,.................. 1 OOc.
Cyrus Travis ,.. 1 00
Geo. T. Wisner ,.. 25 00 .
L. M. Fair......................... 5 00
C. R. Bull. :........ 5 00-
C. P. Smith .' ,.... 5 00
H. Tuthill ; . . . 3 00
J. T. Thompson . .. .. . .. .. . . .. 2 00
E. G. Masten & Bros... .. . . .. . . .. . 2 00
C. W. Kerner , . .. .. 2 00
Wilson & Osborne............. . . . 5 00
S. Wilkin.......................... 5 00
J.M. Knapp .. :. .. ... .... . .. .. ... 5 ,00
S. Hadden.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : .. : . . . . 5 00
Geo. M. Roe & Co................. 5 00
B. H. Henderson.................. 10 00
N. R. Feagler..................... 5 00
Joseph Board..................... 5 00
Ayrnar Van. Buren................ 10 00
W. L. Ogden................... . . 5 00
F. L. Millspaugh.... . . . . . . . . .. . . 1 00
.Dudley Mjller ·
.:. .5 00
New JerseyAssociation of Trotting
Horse Breeders... . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 00 ..
• J. HiCoster : 25 00.
W. H. Tailer.. .. . . . . . . . .. . .. .. . . . . 25 00
F. K. Sturgis. . . .. . . .. . .. . .. . .. . . . . ..25 00
C. D. Moss....... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 00
Lawrence Kip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 00
J. L. Barclay ..... :................ 25 00
F. W. Vanderbilt.... . . .. . . . . . . . . 25 00
Joh.n Alexandre ·
...... 25 00
.A. N. Morris. . . .. . . .. . . .. .. .. . .. .. . 25 00
David Bonner........... . .. .. .. . 25 00
A. A. Bonner...................... 25 00
A. C. Hall .. ,
·
............ 25 00
H. W. T. Mali.... . . .. .. .. .. . .. . . . 25 00
C.H. Kerner...................... 25 00
P.A. Leman.' 25 00
W. B. Dickerman........ . .. . .. . .. 10 00
-Ionathan Hawkins................ 25 00
Prederiek P. Olcott............... 25 00
National Association of Trotting
Horse Breeders 2.50 00
Leland Stanford 500 00
Interest collected from deposits... 67 72
$2,083 72
By Postage........ . . . . . . . . . . . . . Printing Circulars . . . . . . . . . . Cash book.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $10 00
19 00
1 10
Syenite Grante Co. for monu-
merit. ....
•
... , 1,500 00
E. B. Kotch Ganite Co. for
for setting monument. etc: 220 00
Sand Stone, etc., for foon-
da.tiop.. . .. . . . . .. . . .. . . . .. . . Plot of Ground.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24, 00
60 00
E. B. Kotch Granite Co. for
fence and setting.......... 255 OQ
By Balance (used in partially
paying for printing this re-
port)......... .. . .. . .. . . . . . . 4 62
$2.083 72
"I'he Monument is erected on a commanding .site on the farm formerly owned
by William M. Rysdyk at Chester, Orange Co., New-York; is of Red Granite, 26 feet
10 inches in hight and 6 feet square at the base.
NEW YORK,
May. 1, 1898.
W. F. REDMOND,
Treasurer •
.
wick. Jealousy-which, regrettably enough, is al-
ways a factor in turf affairs-without doubt pre-
vented many people from subscribing·
.
Very few western names appear. J. H. Fen-
ton, who gave $10, was the head of a then-leading
firm of manufacturers of turf goods in Chicago;
E. H. Brodhead, of Milwaukee, who gave $25, was
one of the leading breeders of Wisconsin; D. J.
Campau, of Detroit, was the publisher of the de-
funct Chicago "Horseman"; Rev. T. A. Hendricks
I
was one of the most brilliant of the non-profes-
sional turf writers, using the pen name of "Aure-
lius"
-he died a year or two ago as Roman Ca.tho ltc
Bishop of Manila, in the Philippines; Dudley Miller
11 as then the manager of the "Horse World," of
Buffalo, N. Y.
-he met a tragic death soon after.
At this distance of time it is impossible for me
to identify all the names upon the list, some of
them being completely strange to me. Among those
which I recognize as belonging to Orange county,
,
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBE:ft 15, 1920 THE HORSE REVIEW 1225
however, I may enumerate Charles Backman, Guy
Mll!er, J. C. Howland, Harrison Mills, John E.
Wood, T. S. Durland, J. C. Hoyt, Geo. T. Wisner, C.
R. Bull, H. Tuthill, S. Wilkin, J. M. Knapp, Geo. M.
Roe & co.. N. R. Feagles (Feagler Is a palpab\e
misprint), F. L. Millspaugh, and Jonathan Hawkins.
Most of these men had either bred or owned noted
sons of Hambletonlan. At Stony Ford Mr. Back-
man had a whole galaxy of sons of the "hero of
Chester," but his enduring title to fame was won
as the breeder of Electioneer, whom he used but
1:11ightly before selling him to Leland Stanford.
Jonathan Hawkins was the breeder of both Dexter
2: 17 ¼ and Dictator-and may I be pardoned for
pausing to say that he was the first breeder of a
trotting champion that I ever personally met? That
is to say, o! a world's champion, as Dexter was.
Only a few days after I joined the staff of the
HORSE REVIEW, in the spring of 1892, about a
year before the publication of this list of donors,
Mr. Hawkins visited Chicago and called at the RE-
VIEW office, and from a talk with which he favored
several members of the editorial force, I wrote a
resume of his personal reminiscences of Clara. the
daughter of American Star, from whose unions with
Hambletonian sprang so renowned a family.
It seems somewhat peculiar to note that while
the names of David and Alley Bonner figure on the
list, that of Robert Bonner is missing. As a mat-
ter 'of fact, there are many names missing that one
would have thought must appear. Why they do net
is one ,if those Interesting questions capable of
many different answers-in each individual case
different factors entering. One would suppose that
few horsemen would fall to cont'rlbute at lea.st his
"mite" to so wor thv a cause-yet it is characteristic
of human nature that many worthy causes go un-
supported by those most log-ically to be exnocted to
come to their support. As a matter of fact, the
welfare of a cause itself is very often pependent
upon the effectiveness· of the appeal made for it.
If this appeal lacks force or persuasiveness. the
results are ant to disappoint. One has onlv to
bear in mind the case of the Grant Tomb, on River-
side Drive, New Yorlc City. For years the collec-
tion of the fund for its erection, by popular sub-
scription, dragged dismally along. Despite the fact
that the structure was to be Imposingly beautiful,
both monumentally and historically, and a national
shrine, also that New York was to possess it in per-
pctuttv, the citizens of the Metropolis proved en-
tirely unworthy of such an honor, and it was finally
necessary for a group of patriotic Chicago men to
take the matter in hand and raise the remainder of
the amount needed to insure the erection of the
mausoleum. Moved by indignation at New York's
indifference, and by the fact that Grant himself
had been. at a momentous period of his life, a citi-
zen of Illinois, the Chicagoans "got together" and
speedily "put over" the necessary subscriptions-
but for which the project bade fair never to have
been realized.
Had the canvass for the fund for Hambleto-
nian's monument been differently conducted, it is
probable that a much larger sum would have been
raised than was the case; also that Leland Stan-
ford would never have ·felt obligated to increase his
original contribution from $100 to $500, to have
assured the guarantee.
There yet remains to be noted one important
personal detail. Upon the list does not appear the
name of the late William Russell Allen, of Allen
Farm, Pittsfield, Mass., who, upon his own initia-
tive, donated the granite from which the towering
shaft was cut. It was quarried from his own quar-
ries, in the heart of the Ozarks, in Missouri, and
not far from the noted Iron Mountain Farm, of
present Secretary w. H. Smollinger, of the Amer-
ican Trotting Association. As wi ll be noted, there
is among the items of disbursement one of $1,500
to the Syenite Granite Co., which covered the ex-
pense of the shaping and polishing of the granite
blocks which Mr. Allen at his own expense pro-
vided. After delivery at Goshen-which costs, we
believe, Mr. Allen also defrayed-the setting of the
shaft cost $22.0 more, and the sandstone foundation
$24, while the iron railing (now removed) and its
foundation, cost $255. The ground upon which
the monument stands cost but $50; from which it
may be surmised that, despite recent appreciation
in value, It woulc1 not cost inordinately to carry out
the idea.advanced above-i. e., purchase the houses
and lots on each side of the monument, remove the
houses and park the entire plot of ground in an
appropriate manner.
* • •
After carefully scrutinizing the list of donors
and endeavoring to obtain all procurable informa~
tlon, there seem to be living today but five of the
gentlemen whose names are included. In the order
1ln which they appear, these are as follows:
w. F. REDMOND, of Madison, N. J. As treas-
urer of the National Association of Trotting Horse
,Breeders, Me. Redmond Issued the report repro-
duced. He is still breeding trotters, and among
the noted ones of recent years which he has bred
may be mentioned Al Maclc 2:05½, Guy Nella
2:06¾, and The American Girl,2:09 ½.
GUY MILLER, of Chester, stlll living on the
farm in the outskirts of the v!llage which for so
many years has been his home. ' Mr. Miller is the
dean of the surviving Orange county breeders, and
I had the pleasure of a visit with him last August
when I attended the Goshen meeting. In his youth
Mr. M!ller cared for Hambletonian for a number
of years, and the great progenitor stood at public
service for an extended period at the present Miller
rarrn,
D. J. CAMPAU, of Detroit, Mich. Mr. Campau,
who, as above-stated, was proprietor of the Chicago
"Horseman" at the time the monument was erected,
also the "power behind the throne" in harness rac-
ing affairs at Detroit, has for so m e years past been
an absentee from the light harness world.
ALBER'£ C. HALL, of New York City. Mr.
Hall, still hale and hearty, respected and esteemed
by a host of friends in the trotting world, is just as
much of an enthusiast over the light harness horse
as ever. He has bred and owned many good trot-
ters, and now has a rnrmbar of very high-class ones
by Lee Axworthy 1:581/4, and other sires, in the
stable of Thomas W. Murphy and others. Mr. Hall,
whom I have known for many years, I also met at
Goshen last summer. As is well known, he is one
of the "old guard" of "regulars" at Lexington every
fall, not having missed a meeting there in years.
In many ways, a chat with Mr. Hall is one of the
greatest pleasures which a horseman of a later
generation can enjoy.
W. B. DICKERMAN, of New York City and
Hillanddale Farm, Mamaroneck, N. Y. As it is al-
most needless to state, Mr. Dickerman ls the senior
breeder of America who still maintains a complete
breeding establishment of his own; and from it he
has not failed to send out, every sea.son for many
past, a galaxy of stars. During 1919 his stable, in
charge of Harry Fleming, was one of the most for-
midable on the Grand .Circuit, though not a large
one, and was headed by Nedda 2:03¼, the cham-
pion trotting mare of the year.
.. . .
In the foregoing paragraphs I have endeavored
in a not-too-prolix way, to give some account of
the monument to Hambletonian and how and why
it was erected. In closing t would say, however,
what has probably occurred involuntarily' to every
reader-namely, that Hambletonian's truest, most
imposing and permanent memorial is constituted
by the American standard-bred trotter of today and
his relatives in blood, all descended from the same
source, which flourish in all lands overseas where
trotting is an organized sport.
While many basic elements went to its cre-
ation, the standard breed is dominantly Hamble-
tonian. Generations ago all other streams were
gathered as tributary rllls into the mighty current
which originated in the little town of Chester, Or-
ange county, New York, when, on May 5, 1849, in
a pasture lot belonging to Jonas Seely, the Charles
Kent mare, daughter of imported Bellfounder, there
foaled a bay colt to the cover of Abdallah, son of
Mambrino, by imported Messenger. That date and
that event are by so much the most memorable in
the history of the breed, and of tbe evolution of
speed at both harness gaits, universally speaking,
that all others sink into insignificance in compari-
son. God-and nature, his chief expression-
"works
in a mysterious way his wonders to perform." Why
nature had decreed that Hambletonian should come
into the world when and how he did, and thereafter
accomplish what he did, is a mystery inscrutable.
All human attempts to explain such mysteries in
the encl add only to their inexplicability. Let us be
content merely to revere the greatness and pre-
serve the memory of this incomparable horse, whose
·lilrn the world has never seen, and never will again.
BINGBNWOOD FARM STALLIONS
H. L. F'Iauss, manager of Bingenwood Fa... [truncated due to length]
