descent
If alive today, Descent would be eligible to the Living Hall of Fame in the broodmare category, having a $1 million winner, Davidia Hanover and a $500,000 winner, Ditka Hanover.
Descent was a 1975 bay filly by Speedy Crown out of Pizzaz by Ayres. Her second dam was Sprite Rodney by Rodney. Bred by Robert Mumma of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Descent was owned during her racing career by James Leroy (Red) Dowds, also of Pennsylvania. The filly was trained and driven by Jimmy Arthur.
As a two-year-old, Descent won the Breeders Filly Stakes. The following year, she won the Hanover Hempt Filly Trot, the Coaching Club Trotting Oaks, a heat of the Bluegrass, and was second in a division of the Hambletonian Oaks. Descent took her record of 2:00 winning a heat of the 1978 Holly Lane at Lexington's Red Mile. Descent raced with the best fillies on the Grand Circuit and in the Pennsylvania Sire Stakes program. Her racing career earnings totaled $115,428.
Hanover Shoe Farms acquired Descent for its broodmare band at the end of her racing career. Fourteen of her fifteen foals were by Super Bowl, seven with records under two minutes. She was the dam of Davidia Hanover 4,1:56 ($1.108 million), Ditka Hanover 2,1:57.3, winner of $585,388, Demilo Hanover 3,1:55.1 ($395,042) and Desdemona Hanover 3,1:57.2 ($377,618). Offspring of Descent have total earnings to date of $2,753,283.
Descent died in 1996 and is buried at Hanover Shoe Farms, Hanover, Pennsylvania.
Hanover Shoe Farms, Hanover, PA
Published in the Harness Racing Museum's 2002 Souvenir Journal