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Arts And Letters




  Sire Ribot
  Grandsire Tenerani
  Dam All Beautiful
  Damsire Battlefield
  Sex Stallion
  Foaled 1966
  Country United States
  Colour Chestnut
  Breeder Paul Mellon
  Owner Rokeby Stable Racing silks: Dark gray, yellow braids, sleeves and cap
  Trainer Elliott Burch
  Record 23: 11-6-1
  Earnings $632,404
  Race Blue Grass Stakes (1969)<br> Everglades Stakes (1969)<br> Belmont Stakes (1969)<br> Jim Dandy Stakes (1969)<br> Travers Stakes (1969)<br> Metropolitan Handicap (1969)<br> Jockey Club Gold Cup (1969)<br> Grey Leg Handicap (1970)
  Awards US Champion 3-Yr-Old Colt (1969)<br> US Champion Handicap Male Horse (1969)<br> United States Horse Of The Year (1969)
  Honours United States Racing And Hall Of Fame (1994)<br> #67 - Top 100 US Racehorses Of The 20th Century
  updated November 15, 2006


Arts and Letters (1966-1998) was an American Hall Of Fame Champion Thoroughbred Racehorse .

Owned and Bred by American sportsman, and noted Philanthropist Paul Mellon , and trained by future Hall of Famer Elliott Burch , the colt began racing at age two. He won two of his six starts in 1968, then at age three won two important Kentucky Derby prep races before finishing second in both the Derby and the Preakness Stakes to the undefeated California colt, Majestic Prince .

He carried the well-known dark grey, yellow braids, sleeves and cap. Arts and Letters came back to win the 1½ mile .

At age four, Arts and Letters won one of three races, his career ending after an injury in the Californian Stakes .

Standing at Stud at Greentree Farm , he met with reasonable success. The most notable of his Stakes winning offspring is Codex , who gave trainer D. Wayne Lukas his first win in the U.S. Triple Crown race by capturing the 1980 Preakness Stakes .

In 1994, Arts and Letters was inducted in the United States' National Museum Of Racing And Hall Of Fame .

Arts and Letters died at the advanced age of 32 in 1998 (though this date is listed as 2000 with the Jockey Club). He was buried at Greentree Farm which is now part of Gainesway Farm .


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