Deputy Minister (horse)

Deputy Minister (1979–2004) was a Canadian-bred Thoroughbred horse racing Champion. At age two, he won eight out of his nine starts and was voted the 1981 Sovereign and Eclipse Award winner as North American Champion 2-Yr-Old, and was also voted Canada's Sovereign Award for Horse of the Year. Early in his 1982 campaign, Deputy Minister wrenched an ankle while competing in the Bahamas Stakes at Hialeah Park, which restricted his racing that year.

After a good 1983 season in which he won the Gulfstream Park Sprint Championship, Donn Handicap and Tom Fool Handicap, Deputy Minister was retired to stand at stud at the Maryland branch of Windfields Farm, where he sired future U.S. Hall of Famer Go for Wand. By 1989, his success as a sire led to his being moved to Fred Seitz's Brookdale Farm in Versailles, Kentucky, where he spent the rest of his life. A career sire of 80 Graded stakes race winners, Deputy Minister was also the damsire of 108 stakes winners.

In 1988, he was inducted into the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame.

Deputy Minister died of a malignant tumor at the Ohio State University veterinary hospital in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried at Brookdale Farm.

Selected progeny

Sire of:

• Open Mind, won Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies, voted American Champion Two-Year-Old Filly (1988)
  American Champion Three-Year-Old Filly (1989)
• Go For Wand : U.S. Champion Filly (1989, 1990), U.S. Racing Hall of Fame (1996)
• Mane Minister : won Santa Catalina Stakes (1991), third in all three U.S. Triple Crown races
• Dehere : U.S. Champion 2-Year-Old-Colt (1993)
• Better Than Honour : dam of Belmont Stakes winners Jazil and Rags To Riches, Casino Drive
• Awesome Again : Queen's Plate (1997), Breeders' Cup Classic (1998)
• Touch Gold : Haskell Invitational Handicap (1997), Belmont Stakes (1997)
• Deputy Commander : Travers Stakes (1997), Super Derby (1997)
• Keeper Hill : Las Virgenes Stakes (1998), Kentucky Oaks (1998)
• Silver Deputy, a top North American sire of more than 75 stakes winners including six Champions

Grandsire of :

• Silverbulletday : U.S. Racing Hall of Fame inductee, U.S. Champion 2-Yr-Old Filly of 1998 and the U.S. Champion 3-Yr-Old Filly of 1999. Multiple G1 race winner including the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies, Kentucky Oaks
• Left Bank - 2002 American Champion Older Male Horse
• Ghostzapper : U.S. Horse of the Year (2004), World's Top Ranked Horse (2004)
• Round Pond : Breeders' Cup Distaff (2006)
• Deputy Glitters : Ohio Derby (2006), Tampa Bay Derby (2006)
• Paynter: Haskell Invitational Handicap (2012)
• Oxbow : Preakness Stakes (2013)

Damsire of :

• Sarava : winner of the Belmont Stakes (2002)
• Halfbridled : Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies (2003), U.S. Champion 2-Yr-Old Filly (2003)
• Kane Hekili, multi-millionaire colt, won four Grade 1 races in Japan including the 2005 Japan Cup Dirt
• Bob and John : Wood Memorial Stakes (2006)
• Jazil : Belmont Stakes (2006)
• Curlin : 2007 American Champion Three-Year-Old Male Horse, 2007 and 2008 American Horse of the Year Two Time Winner Of The Jockey Club Gold Cup, Highest Earning American Horse In History With over 10 million in earnings.
• Rags to Riches : Kentucky Oaks (2007), Belmont Stakes (2007), American Champion Three-Year-Old Filly (2007)
• Casino Drive : Peter Pan Stakes (2008)
• Man of Iron : Breeders' Cup Marathon (2009)

References

• ESPN obituary profile
• Deputy Minister at the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame
• Deputy Minister's pedigree and racing stats