The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-09-13
AGREAT MOTHER OF TRO1TERS
let THIS MARE MAS HERSELF 4
CREATE RE- or OBSCl RITi.
Curious History Of the Dam of PAGE
Emerged from Gbscurii. nj Chester
n. y. md Returned TO II nj Chicago
Nothing known Of Origin or breeding

OF American trOttIhS Ho'seS ilau us oIiS'i
at this little village n Omar 90 county,
where the ancestors, near or remote, OF
all the wonderful trotters and PAGERS Of
to-day were bcgotten, it being the home OF
that sire of Tres, Hamblet oman, nowhere
else is interest in light harhless horse flesh
and its achievements more alive or UNI
versal. Pedigrees and records ar" at the
tongues end of man, woman or child
and nowhere are notable events III the
trotting or pacing world followed by such
floods of reminisoence
Page, the game son of Hambletonian's
son Polonius and the Dubois mare, was
born and bred in Chester and until the
her day had for years held the mile record
for Orange county bred horses, 2loA.
The Stony Ford champion, Swift. lowered
it to Posi-
This dethroning of the Chester horse
las filled the village with horse talk, and
from it has come the story of an eXtraor-
tinary brood mare. whose progeny has
won fame and torture and whose beginning
and end are alike wrapped in ob,cur'ty
Twenty years ago from load of horses
that had come from the West to Bulls
Head market in New York, Pat Burns, a
farmer living near Centreville, this county,
purchased lay mare. He brought her
home ard subsequently, traded her to
Tom Dubois, a bartender at cross roads
hosiery on the Goshe ard Florida road
Tom Dubo;s'- brother Ben, Chester
blacksmith. came into possession of the
mare, and it was found that she could step
along ut a $50 gait
- l,x h1r 1,,t to
who came along. and she was always on
the 60, day and night, She became famous
for her toughness and willingness. She
WAS always in good condition. Nobody
ever saw her tired.
One day a citizen who had mare he
thought pretty we'll of went to Ben's shop
and said he knew a man who was willing
TO bet fifty that his mare could beat the
Dubois mare a mile and do it easy. Ben
was busy shocng horse, and he told the
citizen that his mare had been out on the
road all day, and he didn't know that she
was not out YET, but if the citizen would send
his man to the barn to feed the mare if she
was in, he would hook her up and give the
man with the fifty chance to win another
one
Inc CULCn man went W il' buuOls
barn The mare had just come in from
twentv-mie drive The man returned to
his employer after a while, grinning. and
said he had fixed her The citizen asked
him what he meant.
why. she was pretty well het up re-
piled the man. and gave her two big
tobacco pals of water and she drinked
every drop We win the race, all right
The citizen rebuked the man, for he
could see nothing ahead of the Dubois mare
but inevitable founder and ruin. But he
didn't call the bet off, and it slipped his
mind about mentioning the watering OF
the mare to Ben Dubois.
When Ben finished the shoeing Of the
horse he hooked up his mare and drove 10
the half-rnile track on the Wisner Wood
farm at Chester. The citizen was there
with his mare. and he was surprised to see
no evidence that the Dubois mare cared
even a little bit about those two tobacco
pals of water
The race was trotted. and the Dubois
mare won 1t without its disturbing her
a bit. Then she trotted on to q creek that
flows at one edge of The track. where she
stopped to take another drink.
Ben Dubois was little slow in uncheck-
ing her. and she kicked him out of the
sulky, and trotted another circuit Of the
track before she stopped.
Some time afterward the mare was bred
to J. c. Howland's Polonius. the last son
of old Hambletonian. She dropped a
colt, and was bred back to Polonus
While she was with foal with this colt
MI, 80, 4
mood at Goshen one day, and traded the
mare for little or nothing to Gov. Hinch-
man of Paterson. Then j. d, Rowland
went to Goshen and traded three hundred
dollar stop watch to Hinchman for the
mare and brought her back to Chester.
Before the mare dropped her second
colt, Rowland disposed Of her to T. S.
Durland of Chester, reserving the foal,
w hich proved to be a colt. The first
colt was named Button, the second one
Alta, after the trainer and driver, Alta
Mcdonald. They both made their mark.
and Blackburn Miller of New1.rgh paid
Ben Dubois 81 900 for Button and bought
Alta of Rowland for $500.
Button and his brother Alta were such
perfect match in every way, except that
Button had the most speed, he having
earned a mark Of 2:28, that it was impossible
for any person not familiar with them to
tell the one from the other.
One time in race in which Alta was
matched at Armenia, n. y, when it was
seen that Alta did not have the speed to
win, Button was substituted for him in the
deciding heats and won the race. and no
one there, except his driver and owner,
knew the difference.
T. S. Durland got two colts from the
Dubois mare by Polonius. which became
crack purse winners. and On Time and
Reality have prominent places in that
blue book OF equine aristocracy, where the
name of no light harness horse that has
not the $50 mark or less to its credit can
have its name entered-"The List"
In 1892 the Dubois mare dropped her sixth
colt to Polonius, and this one developed
into the famous trottcr Page. A a four
vear-old he was sold by Durland to Frank
Tilford of New York for $500. few
months later the colt was worth as many
thousands, for that same year he leaped
into national fame from the sensational
race in which he made the great time Of
2,n94 Previous to this record performance,
Durland traded Pages dam to n man in
Topeka, Kan. She was then with foal
again to Polonus.
When Page bogan to show tho great
stuff that was in him horsemen nwoke
to show Of interest in the dam that could
produce such wonders as all OF her colts
had proved to be- and n strong desire to
recover her and fetch her back to Orange
county or some other trotting horse breed
ing lo2a', became manifest.
As TO her origin nothing could ba ascer-
tat,n SI,n l,r cttrt' :,