It has been estimated that he got about one thousand three hundred foals, and for several years it was one of the amusing features of horse literature to see how many writers were able to demonstrate that as a progenitor of speed he was a failure. This item of one thousand three hundred foals was taken as the basis of computation, and then with the small number of forty trotters out of the one thousand three hundred, the percentage of trotters was very small. The next step was to find some unknown horse, generally a pacer, that had only two or three foals to his credit and one of them had made a record of 2:30, thus showing a much larger percentage than Hambletonian, and by that much he was a greater sire than Hambletonian. All this foolishness has now subsided in the face of the fact that the great mass of the trotters of today have more or less of his blood in their veins, and in a very short time that blood will abound in greater or less strength in every American trotter. The tables which here follows will make this fact evident to all who will study them.

[Prefatory to these tables and to the other statistics concerning the present rank of the trotting families given in the pages following, an explanatory paragraph is in order so that they may not be misunderstood. (1) They are based on the tables given in the Year Book for 1896, and I regret to say that these tables are so emasculated, incomplete, unsatisfactory and in many cases contradictory one of the other that it is literally impossible to compile from them statistics that may be accepted as absolutely correct and letter perfect. However, as this work is not intended as one for statistical reference, the tables being approximately correct serve my purpose, which is merely to show relatively and with substantial accuracy the standing of the sires and families embraced to the close of 1896. (2) By the term “standard performers” is meant horses that have acquired trotting records of 2:30 or better, or pacing records of 2:25 or better. The Year Book no longer gives a 2:30 pacing list, and it should be noted that pacers with records between 2:30 and 2:25 are not credited in these tables. (3) The tables are designed to show (a) the number of standard performers got by each sire named. (b) The number of his sons that are sires of standard performers. (c) The number of his daughters that are dams of standard performers. (d) The number of standard performers produced by these sons and daughters, and finally, in the last column, the total number of standard performers produced in the two generations—i. e., by the sire himself, and by his sons and daughters. The dates of foaling and death are important in considering the opportunities of the families embraced.]

The first table following gives some idea of the supremacy of the Hambletonian family over all others. When we seek a rival to Hambletonian as a trotting progenitor we must do so among his sons; and by turning to the second table it will be noted that many of these outrank the founders of any and all the other great trotting families.

FOUNDERS OF THE GREAT TROTTING FAMILIES.

Name.Year foaled.Year died.Standard performers.Producing sons.Producing daughters.Standard performers produced by sons and daughters.Total No. Standard performers in two generations.
Hambletonian18491876401488016651705
Blue Bull18581880604777211271
Mambrino Chief1844186262317119125
Ethan Allen1849187662218118124
Pilot Jr.1858186586187280
George M. Patchen1849186441547074
Champion (807)185318748675361

In this table Ethan Allen is given as the representative of his family in preference to his sire, Black Hawk, the real founder, for the reasons that he was a far greater horse, and makes a better showing than his sire, and further because he was a contemporary of Hambletonian. For exactly the same reasons George M. Patchen is given as the representative progenitor of the Clay line.

The next table demonstrates what the Hambletonian family has done in the second and third generations, and the relative standing of the leading sub-families of the greatest trotting line. It embraces separately every sire that has to his own credit and to the credit of his sons and daughters an aggregate of fifty or more standard performers, twenty-three in all, while the totals to the credit of all the other sons of Hambletonian are grouped in the last line:

FAMILIES OF HAMBLETONIAN’S SONS.

Name.Year foaled.Year died.Standard performers.Producing sons.Producing daughters.Standard performers produced by sons and daughters.Total No. Standard performers in two generations.
George Wilkes1856188283948118011884
Electioneer186818901546543493647
Happy Medium18631888925147272364
Harold18641893444345248292
Dictator18631893524442234286
Volunteer18541888344048221255
Strathmore18661895712654158229
Abdallah (15)1852186551429199204
Aberdeen18661892452519110155
Egbert1875——75251874149
Messenger Duroc.1865189-232441125148
Edward Everett18551878131216112125
Administrator1863189214204493107
Jay Gould1864189429142876105
Victor Bismarck1867189-3113136495
Cuyler186818941515367489
Masterlode1868189-2817165785
Sweepstakes1867189-354203974
Sentinel1863187389145765
Middletown18601891149114963
Squire Talmage18661891239143558
Dauntless1867189-31692051
Echo1866189-169153450
Other sons (125)————6182294129801600

This table shows what each horse himself produced, and how his blood is breeding on through his sons and daughters; and above all it demonstrates the stupendous fact that in three generations the Hambletonian family has produced upward of seven thousand standard performers, and all facts and all experience now beyond cavil justify what I ventured to declare in Wallace’s Monthly many years ago: “The Hambletonian line stands above all other lines and must survive because it is the fittest.”