Background
John Edward Madden was born on December 28, 1856, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He was of Irish descent.
His grandfather having been a political refugee who emigrated to the United States with his family.
(Excerpt from Madden's Stallion Record of Horses Not Well ...)
Excerpt from Madden's Stallion Record of Horses Not Well Known Whose Pedigrees Appear in Many of Our Present Day Great Trotters Abraham 353, b. H. Foaled 1862. Name of breeder unknown. vas the property of Benjamin H. Baldwin, Whitehall, N. Y., when he first attracted attention as a sire of speed. Sire Daniel Lambert 102 (which see); dam Polly Cook, by Vermont Black Hawk 5; 2md dam Young Poll, by Young Sir Charles, son of Sir Charles by Duroc. Died in 1892. Abraham sired six trotters, the fastest being Frank who with a running mate made a record of in a race. None of Abraham's sons sired speed, but his daughters produced five trotters and two pacers, the fastest being the double-gaited horse Monopole, trot ting and pacing. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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John Edward Madden was born on December 28, 1856, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He was of Irish descent.
His grandfather having been a political refugee who emigrated to the United States with his family.
As a boy, after working in the steel mills at Bethlehem, Madden became a professional athlete, as a foot-racer, broad-jumper, boxer, and oarsman, later retiring to become a manager of other athletes. Having a natural love for horses, he began investing his savings in trotters. His ventures from the first were unusually successful, which he himself attributed to "luck and logic, " and he soon accumulated a good working capital. Two of the first horses of note that he acquired, the gelding Class Leader, 2:22 1/4, and the stallion Warlock, he bought for low prices and sold for $10, 000 each.
After establishing himself firmly as a judge of trotting horses, he turned to the thoroughbred. He was not merely interested in race horses because of their financial possibilities but aspired to become a breeder of great horses.
Purchasing a farm near Lexington, Kentucky, in the heart of the blue-grass region, he there embarked in the breeding business, first in a small way; then, by gradual expansion, he became one of the largest breeders in the world, his stud including over four hundred brood mares at one time and a dozen or more famous stallions. He became America's leading breeder of winners in 1916 and remained so annually for eleven years.
During the fourteen years preceding his death, horses bred by him had won over 5, 000 public races and over $5, 000, 000 in stake and purse money on both sides of the Atlantic, for many horses of his breeding were sent abroad to race in his own and other colors. Two horses of his breeding were Zev, winner of $313, 639, the largest amount of money at that time credited to any horse, in America or Europe, and Princess Doreen, from 1925 to 1931 the leading American money-winning mare, credited with $174, 745.
He bred also no less than five winners of the Kentucky Derby: Old Rosebud (1913), Sir Barton (1919), Paul Jones (1920), Zev (1923), and Flying Ebony (1925). He continued to breed trotters throughout his career, but on a smaller scale, and produced many famous ones, Periscope, 2:03 1/2, Margaret Parrish, 2:06 1/4 (the dam of Arion Guy, 1:59 1/2, and grand-dam of Protector, 1:59 1/4, and The Marchioness, 1:59 1/4, and others. His sales of both trotters and thoroughbreds for sensational prices were constant and made him facile princeps in the turf world.
Madden died on November 3, 1929, at his hotel in New York City.
(Excerpt from Madden's Stallion Record of Horses Not Well ...)
Madden was a man of striking personality, combining a Herculean physique with a mentality of great force and acumen. He was celebrated for his epigrams and aphorisms and his quickness in both thought and action. These qualities enabled him to accumulate a tremendous fortune.
Madden was married to Ann Megrue, of Cincinnati, Ohio, from whom he was divorced many years before his death.