Old North Bridge Hounds
Wentworth Archer Is Best In Show at New England
Best in Show Wentworth Archer 2015 is shown by huntsman Rachel Duffy. Standing (l-r) is Judge Don Philhower, huntsman, Millbrook Hunt; Daun DeFrance, MFH, Wentworth Hounds; and Dominic Cammarata, MFH, Norfolk Hunt.
The ninetieth annual New England Hound Show was hosted by the Norfolk Hunt (MA) at their Steeplechase Course in Medfield on Sunday, May 5, 2019. Seven district hunts exhibited foxhounds: Green Mountain Hounds (VT), Myopia Hunt (MA), Norfolk Hunt (MA), North Country Hounds VT), Old North Bridge Hounds (MA), Tanheath Hunt (CT), and Wentworth Hunt (NH).
Entries competed in three divisions—American, Penn-Marydel, and Crossbred—but North American foxhunting is currently going through a confusing period in which foxhounds registered as American may defy the thinking of some traditionalists.
Norfolk Blarney is Grand Champion at New England
Grand Champion Norfolk Blarney with (l-r) Dominic Cammarata, MFH, kennelman Alyse Phipps, and Tom Lewis, MFH / Eric Schneider photo
The New England Foxhound Show was hosted by the Norfolk Hunt in their Dover, Massachusetts country on May 6, 2018. Six hunts from four of the six New England States brought hounds: Green Mountain Hounds (VT), Myopia Hunt (MA), Norfolk Hunt (MA), Old North Bridge Hounds (MA), Tanheath Hunt (CT), and Wentworth Hunt (NH).
At the end of the day, a tricolor Crossbred dog hound, Norfolk Blarney 2016 (Myopia Bartlett 2008 ex Myopia Rachel 20112), was chosen Grand Champion of Show by Judge John Ike, ex-MFH, visiting from the Millbrook Hunt (NY).
I found Blarney’s breeding to be quite interesting, and I talked to Sue Billings, longtime Norfolk honorary whipper-in, about him as well.
Henry Goodwin Vaughan, A Founding Father
The Norfolk Hunt (MA) can boast of well-known men of American history throughout its earliest rosters—Louis Brandeis, Justice of the U.S, Supreme Court and Leverett Saltonstall, a three-term Governor of Massachusetts and three-term U.S. Senator—but none of its members so dominated the reputation and future of the hunt as did Henry G. Vaughan. He appeared as a member’s guest in 1900 and three years later was elected MFH, a position he held to acclaim for the next thirty years. He was a complete New England gentleman and one of the founding fathers of organized mounted foxhunting in America.
His was hardly the case of a man arriving at a backwater village and uplifting the native savages. Vaughan arrived in Boston from a small town in Maine by way of Harvard University into the midst of the Boston Ames, Cabots, Forbes, Peabodys, Perkinses, and Saltonstalls to be not only embraced, but feted, revered, and almost deified.
Myopia Gammell 2012 Is Grand Champion at New England Hound Show
Myopia Gammell '12, a proud son of Potomac Jefferson '05, shown by huntsman Philip Headdon, was judged Grand Champion of the 2016 New England Hound Show. / Photo by Nature of Light Photography
Myopia Gammell 2012 is the second foxhound this season carrying the blood of the inimitable Potomac Jefferson to be named a Grand Champion of Show, this at the New England Hound Show held on Sunday, May 1, 2016.
Gammell was bred by now-retired huntsman Larry Pitts at Potomac, and drafted unentered to huntsman Tony Gammell at the Keswick Hunt (VA) in exchange for another breeding. Tony in turn drafted the still unentered pup to his pal, Brian Kiely, then huntsman at the Myopia Hunt (MA), who named the hound for Tony. Brian, of course, is now huntsman at Potomac, so that completes another circle, entirely!
Old North Bridge Hounds in the Footprints of Colonial History
Old North Bridge Master and huntsman Virginia Zukatynski and hounds leave the Mary Martha Chapel at Longfellow's Wayside Inn followed by piper Thomas Childs, the field, and guests after the Blessing of Hounds. / Jack McCrossan photo
by Patricia Jackson
The Old North Bridge Hounds (MA) held their Blessing of Hounds on the grounds of historic Longfellow’s Wayside Inn in Sudbury, Massachusetts on October 17, 2015. The blessing took place at Henry Ford’s Martha Mary Chapel on a perfect fall day in New England under clear blue skies and beautiful fall foliage. Master and huntsman Mrs. Virginia Zukatynski, hounds, staff, members, and guests joined together and proceeded past the Inn to the chapel for the blessing.
Spectators enjoyed the sights and sounds as Joint-Master Marjorie Franko led horses and riders over the brick pathways and across the old bridge, following the music of the bagpiper. Longfellow’s Wayside Inn has a long history of hosting foxhunts on the property, including the Norfolk Hunt, the old Millwood Hounds, Myopia, and Harry Worcester Smith's Middlesex Hounds. Situated on the Boston Post Road, one of the oldest commissioned roads in the U.S., much of it built along the two-foot wide Pequot Path used first by native Americans, the Wayside Inn has the distinction of being the country’s oldest operating inn, offering hospitality to travelers along the old road since 1716.
The Wayside Inn, made internationally famous by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s book of poems, Tales of a Wayside Inn, was run by the Howe family. Longfellow visited the Inn in 1862 and his book of poems was published the following year. In it he republished his poem, “Paul Revere’s Ride,” which contains his immortal phrase, “Listen my children and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.” Henry Ford bought the Inn in 1923, restored it, and formed the charitable trust that operates the Inn today.
Wentworth Audrey Is Grand Champion at New England Hound Show
Grand Champion Wentworth Audrey 2013, shown by huntsman Kami Wolk, MFH / Eric Schneider photo Wentworth Audrey 2013 was judged Grand Champion of Show at the New England Hound Show on Sunday, May 4, 2014. The show was held at Echo Ridge Farm in Lee, New Hampshire and was hosted for the first time by the Wentworth Hunt. Audrey is by a Penn-Marydel sire, Red Mountain Van Gogh 2008, out of an American dam, Keswick Nipper 2010.
Audrey's sire, Van Gogh, has his own history. After a couple of stops in the Carolinas, his intelligence earned him a new home in New England where he could hobnob with all the Ivy Leaguers. More on that later.
Huntsman Charles Montgomery from the Bull Run Hunt (VA) judged the foxhounds. Montgomery knows a good hound when he sees one. As huntsman for the Live Oak Hounds (FL) for many years, he consistently fielded a pack of hounds of which an astounding percentage were hound show Champions and Grand Champions.
Wentworth is a drag pack in southern New Hampshire that changed over from Crossbred hounds to American and Penn-Marydel when the current huntsman Kami Wolk, MFH, took up the horn. Kami explained that Audrey was one of two litter sisters that huntsman David Raley drafted to her from the Moore County Hounds (NC). David, in turn, had received the pair from Katherine Gunter, huntsman at the Aiken Hounds (SC) who bred the litter.
Allen Nixon Rodday: My Teacher, My Friend
Allen Nixon “Nick” Rodday died on July 26, 2011 at his home in Brewster, Massachusetts on Cape Cod at the age of ninety. He’d retired there after giving up his horse farm, Elm Brook Farm, in Concord, Massachusetts about thirty years ago. He bought himself a lobster boat and for the next fifteen years fulfilled a longtime ambition. But he still couldn’t resist stabling horses, and before long he was once again leading rides and driving his carriage.
Nick Rodday ran a riding stable, Victory Lee and later Elm Brook Farm, through most of the latter half of the twentieth century. He gave lessons, rented hirelings, and took his clients hunting. He was a charismatic guy with a beautiful tenor singing voice to boot. He taught me to ride and took me hunting. I met my wife-to-be Joan and many others who became good friends in his riding ring. He stood up for me at our wedding. Without question, he changed my life profoundly.
