Sunrise, Sunset: Remembering Christopher and Penny Chenery

Chris Chenery and his daughters, Miggie (left) and Penny (right). From “Secretariat’s Meadow: The Land, The Family, The Legend.”

September 16, 2025

Today, September 16, is one we remember with special affection. It is the 139th anniversary of Christopher Chenery’s birth in 1886. Chris—Granddad—was the patriarch of our family—a man who grew up poor in Ashland, Virginia, hungry for the sort of success that would garner him recognition, respect, and a chance to have his own horses.

If riding claimed first place in his heart, business ran a close second. He had the foresight to consolidate small utilities and turn them into a goldmine. He learned how to enjoy the perks of wealth while keeping present the memory of poverty.

In 1936, his love of horses led him to reclaim his family’s former Doswell, Virginia, plantation. There he began to breed racehorses, achieving early success with the 1950 Horse of the Year, Hill Prince. Other champions followed, best among them First Landing, Sir Gaylord, Cicada. Yet the goal of winning the Kentucky Derby always eluded him. Ultimately, he slipped into dementia, convinced his horse racing days were over. Little did he know that his daughter, my mother, Penny Chenery, would raise his stable to unimagined heights.

Today also happens to be the 8th anniversary of Mother’s death. Whether by coincidence or contrivance, the fact that she departed this world on his birthday is perfect symmetry.  These two events put the brackets on a remarkable chapter in horse racing history.

People are often surprised to hear that Secretariat and Riva Ridge had long antecedents. I tell them that Meadow Stable had the sort of overnight success that comes from 35 years of hard work, dedication, and devotion to excellence.  

Granddad had the genius to discern and acquire the sort of mares that would become “blue hens”, mothers that foaled champion after champion. If this talent paid off well during his active years, it produced spectacular results in his declining years in the shape of Secretariat and Riva Ridge.

It would take his daughter to make the most of the seeds her father sowed. She was not just his offspring in brains and moxie, but also in fierceness and fortune.  An Ivy-League-educated woman who made priceless quips and tough decisions with equal ease, she was the perfect heiress to her father’s many talents. And she adored him.

At the beginning of her tenure at the helm of Meadow Stable, her goal was to achieve her father’s dream of taking home the Derby roses. This she did with Riva Ridge in 1972. But when that same year his flashy younger stablemate began to steamroll down the track, she was on her own—and off on the adventure of a century. Granddad, her lodestar, was gone, as was her mother, and she was up against a phalanx of disdainful men. She didn’t care. She knew she had a horse who could soar above all others, and she unfurled the wings to soar with him.

I remember them both as pioneers who fought steep odds to achieve what they wanted most in life and who did so spectacularly well. Neither sacrifices nor mistakes deterred down.

That in itself would be reason to remember them, but because they gave us Secretariat, we will remember and honor their lives as long as we do his. They left me outsized shoes to fill, and they left us a horse with outsized heart, smarts, and power. Each of them was one of a kind.

Here’s to you, Granddad, Mother, and Big Red!

©Kate Tweedy