Summer 2015

Calumet is currently home to about 265 broodmares and
their foals. Their owner, a native of Franklin, Ky., is the
fourth-largest private landowner by acres in the U.S.,
an avid conservationist who owns several preserves
dedicated to the breeding of rare exotic animals. Most of
his Thoroughbreds are destined for the Calumet racing
stable rather than the auction ring.
“It’s kind of a lost art now, farms that will develop families
and have homebreds that are the core of their racing
stock,” stallion director Ken Wilkins said.
Calumet will breed commercially, however, as well
as to race. “We believe the two are compatible,
notwithstanding the fact that the market can be
somewhat preoccupied with fads, first-year stallions, and
precocious speed horses,” said general manager Eddie
Kane.
Still, Kane said, “Mr. Kelley wants to raise a racehorse. He
gets a bigger thrill out of a good racehorse than a good
sale horse.”
One thing hasn’t changed: Calumet’s iconic fences.
Some 35 miles of fencing received a fresh coat last fall,
even though a 55-gallon drum of white acrylic costs more
than $600, about five times the cost of the more typically
used black paint.
At Calumet’s horse cemetery, a monument to the farm’s
eight Kentucky Derby winners reminds of the “old”
Calumet’s unmatched dominance in America’s classics.
Calumet also bred a ninth Derby winner, Strike the Gold,
campaigned by owner William J. Condren in 1990-93.
This year the farm fielded the largest draft of Triple
Crown nominees for the season, with 15 horses eligible
for the classics. “It’s a great challenge and, really, a great
responsibility for us to try to add a good chapter to a
history that will probably go on beyond us,” Wilkins said.
Hopes are high for this year’s first foals by Oxbow, who
became Calumet’s record eighth Preakness Stakes (gr.
I) winner in 2013. “We believe sound horses with serious
pedigrees that perform in the classics will always be the
mainstay,” Kane said.
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