A small, unwanted colt who became the most influential racehorse of the 20th century
Northern Dancer
Bred at E.P. Taylor's Windfields Farm north of Toronto and considered too small to sell, Northern Dancer won the 1964 Kentucky Derby and went on to become the most influential sire in modern thoroughbred racing.
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Northern Dancer was foaled in 1961 at E.P. Taylor's Windfields Farm north of Toronto, a small, compact colt whose size initially made him hard to sell at auction, leading Taylor to keep and race him himself rather than part with an animal buyers weren't particularly interested in. That decision proved enormously consequential: Northern Dancer won the 1964 Kentucky Derby in what was then a record time, becoming the first Canadian-bred horse to win the race, and went on to win the Preakness Stakes the same year.
An unmatched breeding legacy
Northern Dancer's greater impact came after his racing career ended, as a sire at stud: his offspring and their descendants became so dominant in thoroughbred pedigrees that by the late 20th century, a significant proportion of major stakes winners worldwide traced back to him, an influence breeding experts consider unmatched by any other 20th-century stallion. He died in 1990 and remains one of the most celebrated animals in Canadian sports history, a small colt from a Toronto-area farm who reshaped an entire global industry.
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