Hall of Fame

The brother-in-law of William M. Wright of Calumet Farm and owner of the race mare Justissima, 2:06 1/4, Harry Reno, a promoter of harness racing in the early 1920s, believed the sport and its Grand Circuit needed attractions of major stature. Through his friendship with John C. Bauer, publisher of The Horse Review in Chicago and staff writer Joseph I. Markey, who supported Reno's ideas, he created the first $25,000 American Pacing Derby at Kalamazoo, Michigan on July 22, 1924. Two seasons later, in 1926, they introduced the Hambletonian Stake, a three-year-old trot which grew into the sport's premier event. Harry Reno died in Chicago in 1931 at age sixty-five.

Published in the Harness Racing Museum's 1994 book, The Immortals