The passing of Maritime Traveler closes the book on Secretariat’s last remaining offspring.
BY PATRICIA MCQUEEN
I
n the early 1990s, my quest to photograph members of Secretariat’s last crop included a stop at Bridlewood Farm in Ocala. The farm’s training center housed a 3-year-old named Maritime Traveler, and I visited one foggy-turned-sunny morning that March. When the sun emerged, the colt’s bright red coat gleamed with health, a memory still vivid all these years later.
Farm founder Arthur Appleton had purchased the flashy colt for $55,000 at the 1991 Keeneland September yearling sale. The breeder was renowned Windfields Farm and the colt’s dam, the Northern Dancer mare Oceana, was a full sister to champions Northernette and Storm Bird. The chestnut was one of the last Secretariats ever born; only five more came after he foaled in Ontario on May 15, 1990.
As so often happens, Maritime Traveler as a racehorse failed to live up to his pedigree. He was unplaced in five starts at Woodbine, three in the fall of his 2-year-old year and two more the next spring. His best effort was a fourth in his second start as a 2-year-old in a turf maiden. He earned a grand total of $1,572.
That record didn’t warrant a chance as a breeding stallion. Yet Arthur and Martha Appleton always made sure their horses had a good life, and while the young son of Secretariat would have been a lovely pasture ornament, they had a more meaningful job in mind.
At busy breeding farms where top mares are bred to valuable stallions, great care is taken for the well-being of everyone involved – horses and humans. That’s where a teaser comes into play—a stallion whose main job is to help determine when mares are ready to breed. It was that role in which Maritime Traveler excelled.
Maritime Traveler - ©Patricia McQueen
“He was such an easy horse to tease with and he did his job very efficiently,” longtime Bridlewood general manager George Isaacs recalls.
For most of his working years, the stallion lived in the broodmare division of the farm, in a special paddock next to barren and maiden mares.
“He was quietly teasing them over the fence all the time and the mares got used to having a male horse around. It’s good science and good mare management.”
A number of years later, Maritime Traveler inherited a more active teaser’s role in the stallion barn after a veteran son of In Reality nicknamed Jimmy, passed away. Secretariat’s son handled the transition well, continuing on with his easy-going behavior for several more years. He finally retired from the position after more than two decades on the job. It was time to enjoy his retirement in the Florida sunshine.
Yet not even Isaacs could have guessed that the stallion, by then in his late 20s, would have such an extended retirement.
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A New Quest
Meanwhile, I had embarked another Secretariat quest. Finding known horses back in the early 1990s wasn’t easy; there was no internet or social media. Still, I managed to locate and photograph 27 of the 34 members of Secretariat’s last crop who were in the United States from 1992 to 1994. Appleton’s recorded purchase of Maritime Traveler as a yearling made him one of the easier finds back then.
Finding horses in the modern era is much easier—unless you are looking for horses you don’t even know still exist. That was my challenge almost a decade ago when I started looking for the last living Secretariats—the youngest would have been 26 years old in 2016. The odds said some would still be alive, but they could be on a major farm, hanging out in the backyard of a lucky horse lover, or anywhere in between. I counted my blessings when I located 11 of them and then was thrilled when Maritime Traveler was “discovered” in late 2022 – already at the advanced age of 32. Isaacs always knew there was a Secretariat at Bridlewood, of course, but the years flew by and it just didn’t register that he might be one of the last.
That changed after Bridlewood’s former administrative assistant Christina Clary, who was new to the farm in 2022, saw my stories about the last two known Secretariats at the time (Border Run and Trusted Company, who passed away in late 2022 and mid-2023, respectively). She remembered seeing Secretariat in the pedigree of a horse at the farm. Sure enough, that horse was Maritime Traveler. And for the past two years, Bridlewood’s elder statesman was the last living offspring of who I, and many, believe was the greatest racehorse of all time.
There is something poetic about the last Secretariat being one I had initially photographed at Bridlewood in 1993, bringing my personal quests full circle.
Maritime Traveler officially turned 35 last Jan. 1, exceptionally old for a Thoroughbred and even made it past his actual 35th birthday on May 15. He had injured one eye in late 2023, and gradually lost sight in his other eye as well. Yet he was still eating all his food and munching on his favorite treat, baby carrots. Isaacs and his team knew the old boy well and everyone catered to his needs as the oldest horse that ever lived on the farm. With each passing day, Isaacs fervently hoped no intervention would be necessary and that “the good Lord would take him when he’s ready.”
And so it was meant to be. Sometime in the early morning hours of July 27, Maritime Traveler left this Earth for his final home. He is buried in the Bridlewood cemetery, having earned his place amongst the farm’s most significant horses. Isaacs summarized the stallion’s life with a simple statement: “Maritime Traveler wasn’t destined to be a great racehorse, but he was certainly a great teaser.”
Reflections of a Lifetime
For the first time in 50 years, there are no living sons or daughters of Secretariat. It’s a new reality that requires some adjustment, given their significance over most of my life. It was always inevitable, of course, and the great news is that his bloodline lives on. He may appear further back in pedigrees with each new generation, but the strength of his daughters means that a good number of today’s Thoroughbreds trace to Secretariat. In fact, every starter in the 2025 Kentucky Derby presented by Woodford Reserve (Grade 1), has Secretariat in their pedigree.
There’s no doubt that A.P. Indy and Storm Cat, out of the Secretariat mares Weekend Surprise and Terlingua respectively, were two of the most important stallions of all time. Another grandson, Gone West (out of the Secretariat mare Secrettame), also continues to have major influence. Other successful stallions out of Secretariat mares included Summer Squall, Chief’s Crown, Dehere and Florida-based Sword Dance.
While the female lines of many Secretariat mares continue to produce stakes winners after several generations, Secretariat’s impact isn’t entirely through his daughters. While his sons never carried on his sire line, in at least a couple of cases, that was partly due to unfortunate luck.
His best racing son, 1988 champion 3-year-old colt Risen Star, sired some good runners before his untimely death due to colic complications at the age of 13. In fact, Secretariat almost completed a rare sire triple in the Belmont Stakes. He, of course, won the 1973 Belmont, and Risen Star won the 1988 edition in a manner reminiscent of Secretariat. Then in the 1995 Belmont, Risen Star’s son Star Standard almost defied the odds, finishing second to Thunder Gulch.
Another son, 1978 Canadian champion 2-year-old male Medaille d’Or, sired several stakes winners, including the fast Tour d’Or, who became a top-five Florida-based sire and is an ancestor of 2019 champion older female Midnight Bisou. The third dam of 2021 Horse of the Year Knicks Go is also by Medaille d’Or, so that Maryland-based stallion had quite an impact despite an early death at age 10 after a paddock accident.
There’s at least one other notable Secretariat moment in Florida breeding history. The first son of Secretariat to stand at stud was the first-crop Dactylographer, whose 1977 win in England’s G1 William Hill Futurity also made him the stallion’s first G1 winner. He entered stud at Florida’s Comfort Acres Farm in 1979, an occasion which prompted a congratulatory letter from then-Governor Bob Graham. Dactylographer went on to sire several stakes winners and was regularly among the leading Florida sires of two-year-old winners.
While there are no more Secretariats with us, the stallion’s legacy lives on.
Secretariat descendant Journalism - ©Nikki Sherman / EQUI-PHOTO
ABOUT PATRICIA MCQUEEN
Patricia McQueen spent nearly 40 years photographing Thoroughbreds, traveling North America to cover important annual horse racing events and visit with retired stars at breeding farms.
For more than 20 years, Patricia’s photos were featured in the pages of Thoroughbred Times, an international racing industry weekly. She has also been published in several other magazines, including BloodHorse, Mid-Atlantic Thoroughbred, Thoroughbred Record, The Horse of Delaware Valley, California Thoroughbred, The Florida Horse, American Racehorse, The Horsemen’s Journal, and Racing Action. She was honored with a Photojournalism Award by the Florida Thoroughbred Breeders’ and Owners’ Association and received an Eclipse Award Honorable Mention in Photography.
She recently authored Secretariat’s Legacy, published by SL Publications, which received an Honorable Mention in the prestigious Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award for 2023.
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