Miss Woodford

Miss Woodford
Miss Woodford beating Freeland in 1885
Sire	Billet
Grandsire	Voltigeur
Dam	Fancy Jane
Damsire	Neil Robinson
Sex	Filly
Foaled	1880
Country	United States
Colour	Brown
Breeder	Catesby Woodford & Ezekial H. Clay
Owner	Bowen & Company Dwyer Brothers Stable
Trainer	James G. Rowe, Sr. Frank McCabe (at age 5)
Record	48: 37-7-2
Earnings	$118,270
Major wins
Spinaway Stakes (1882) Pimlico Stakes (1883) Alabama Stakes (1883) Ladies Handicap (1883) Monmouth Oaks (1883) Champion Stakes (1884) Ocean Stakes (1884, 1885, 1886) Freehold Stakes (1885) Monmouth Cup (1888, 1889)
Honours
United States Racing Hall of Fame (1967) Miss Woodford Stakes at Monmouth Park Racetrack
Horse (Equus ferus caballus)
Last updated on 17 November 2010

Miss Woodford (1880-1899) was a brown Thoroughbred racemare that became one of the best American fillies of all time. At one stage she won 16 consecutive races during her racing career.

She was bred by Colonel Catesby Woodford and Colonel Ezekial Clay of Runnymede Farm near Paris, Kentucky. (Ezekial Clay was chairman of the Kentucky State Racing Commission.) Miss Woodford was by Billet, (imported from England, and the leading sire in America in 1883, due almost entirely to his daughter, Miss Woodford), out of the unraced Fancy Jane, by Neil Robinson.

Miss Woodford was sold to Mike and Phil Dwyer of the Dwyer Brothers Stable, to replace Hindoo, their retired champion. The Dwyers liked to race horses, not breed them, so buying the best was how they built their phenomenal stable of winners. In Miss Woodford's case, they traded Hindoo as a stallion prospect plus a couple of fillies (two daughters of the great mare Maggie B.B.: Red and Blue by Alarm, and Francesca by Leamington; Francesca was a stakes winner) to her then owner, George W. Bowen, in exchange for $9,000 cash and his three-year-old filly.

Racing record

Miss Woodford had already raced for Bowen & Company, winning the Spinaway Stakes. After she was purchased by the Dwyers, Miss Woodward, like Hindoo, was trained by National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame inductee, James G. Rowe, Sr. It was a dispute with the Dwyers concerning Miss Woodford that caused Rowe to resign and become a racing official. Eventually James Rowe returned to his first love, training great runners like Sysonby, Colin, two-time Horse of the Year (1900-1901) Commando: the sire of Colin, Peter Pan, Maskette and Sweep.) At the time of acquiring Miss Woodford, the Dwyer brothers already owned a colt who was considered the best of his crop. With the addition of Miss Woodford, they now owned the best colt, George Kinney and the best filly.

One of the highlights of her three-year-old season was in defeating George Kinney, her stablemate who had won the Belmont Stakes. At three, four, and five, Miss Woodford won 16 consecutive races. By the end of her fifth year of racing, Miss Woodford was America's leading money winner having earned $98,179. At this point most owners would have retired her for breeding, the Dwyers weren’t really interested in the breeding, so she continued to race. Big and aggressive, she won six races in less than two months at the age of six.^[1]

One of her best efforts was the Eclipse Stake at the Fair Grounds in St Louis. There she faced the first two winners of the American Derby: Modesty and Volante. Miss Woodford won easily and this win pushed her earnings over the $100,000 mark, the first horse ever to do so in a racing career. She also won the Monmouth Cup at Long Branch Racetrack (twice), the Monmouth Oaks, the Ocean Stakes (three times), the Eatontown Stakes and the West End Hotel Stakes.

In the end Miss Woodford ran in 48 races and won 37 of them, was second in 7 and third in 2. In her three match races, she won two. Her lifetime earnings over the best colts of her day at distances up to 2½ miles amounted finally to $118,270. This made her the highest stakes winning filly in American history. Firenze followed her in earnings, and then came Yo Tambien.

She was sold to James B. A. Haggin and proved the Dwyers were right to keep her racing. Although she produced the stakes winners, George Kessler and Sombre, as well as three other winners from nine foals, none of her progeny even approached her abilities.

Honors

Miss Woodford was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, New York in 1967.

Hall of Fame trainers, Sunny Jim Fitzsimmons, Thomas J. Healey, A. Jack Joyner, R. Wyndham Walden, and Rowe, all thought her one of the best fillies of all time. In a poll among members of the American Trainers Association, conducted in 1955 by Delaware Park Racetrack, Miss Woodford was voted the fifth greatest filly in American racing history. Gallorette was voted first.

The Miss Woodford Stakes has been run at Monmouth Park in her memory since 1952.

She died in 1899 at Elmendorf Farm in Lexington, Kentucky.

See also

• List of leading Thoroughbred racehorses
• Repeat winners of horse races

References

1. ^ Thoroughbred Heritage: Billet Retrieved 2010-11-17

• Miss Woodford's pedigree
• Miss Woodford at The National Sporting Library's Thoroughbred Heritage website
• Miss Woodford in the Hall of Fame
• Women of the Year - Ten Fillies Who Achieved Horse Racing's Highest Honor by the Staff and Correspondents of The Blood-Horse magazine (2004) Eclipse Press ISBN 1-58150-116-1