A Brief History

While Hopewell Farm may be a relative newcomer to the bluegrass, the nomadic Hopewell tribe traversed the property in prehistoric time. From 1,000 B.C. until 500 A.D., the Hopewells interacted with other traders in a complex network, which brought them from southern Ohio into central Kentucky.

Now, some of the best stallions occupy the same land at Hopewell Farm, nearly 6000 acres in the center of the Thoroughbred industry. For several centuries, horses and Native Americans influenced the development of the rich, limestone region along Elkhorn Creek and its various tributaries. In pre-Revolutionary times, the Cherokees, Choctaw, Creek, Iroquois, Shamneed, Illinois, Wyandottes and Delaware nations often stopped by the banks of the Elkhorn, in the shadow of what is now the picturesque Old Frankfort Pike.

Aside from the usual discovery of arrowheads on the property, Hopewell Farm is also fortunate to have a significant burial mound within its boundaries. According to an investigation by the Kentucky Archaeological Survey, the Bulloch Mound, and impressive grave site containing copper and pottery, attests to the land’s scientific and historical significance. After a good rain, the ground still surrenders arrowheads and other artifacts from the days when Native Americans hunted and fished on the rich and fertile land.

When Hopewell Farm owners Rick and Liz Trontz assumed possession of the farm in 1997 from the estate of Carl T. Fisher, they were unaware of the historical connection to the original Hopewells. Mr. Trontz named it Hopewell because the name connotes an optimistic future. Even the welcoming logo suggests a natural burst of energy, as if exploding from inside the earth itself, that becomes increasingly inviting as it cools. Curiously, it wasn’t until much later, when Hopewell Farm General Manager Richard Vimont began his research into the land’s history, that the connection was made between its current name and its rich 3,000 year history.

The land along the Pisgah Pike wasn’t settled by European Americans until after the American Revolution when the Williams family began farming the land. The patriarch, Daniel Williams, had a son whom he named Daniel Jackson WIlliams. The young man was a farmer, teacher and land surveyor who married Sally Hicks. One of their sons, Daniel Jackson Williams, Jr. made the most significant impact on Woodford County. He graduated from Georgetown College at 16 and then entered Transylvania University where he studied law and medicine. During his ownership, the younger Williams expanded the farm to 2,000 acres. After a distinguished teaching and farming career he died in 1881. The Williams family is buried in the family cemetery that Hopewell Farm continues to maintain and make accessible to the WIlliam’s surviving relatives. After briefly owning the farm from 1888 until 1899, the Wooldridge family sold it to W.T. Wiglesworth, who called the farm Faywood, a contraction of Fayette and Woodford Counties, a name if held for nearly 100 years, until Mr. Trontz decided to call it Hopewell.

During the Wiglesworth years, the first racehorses were introduced to the property. But these were Standardbreds. This was also a time when mules were used for most of the chores and cattle, sheep and hogs supplied the bulk of the income. They also grew fruits, vegetables and hay. From its earliest days in the nineteenth century until 1915, the farm grew a substantial hemp crop. Upon the death of W.T.’s son, James Monete Wiglesworth in 1930, the farm declined due to a lack of interest from other family members.

In 1934, it was sold to the renowned opera star George L. Bagby. Under Bagby’s leadership, the mansion was expanded to include a magnificent ballroom with ornate mouldings and other lavish accoutrements. He also built the beautiful spring-fed lake that still supplies water to the farm. But Bagby, because of his touring commitments to major opera houses in New York, Europe and other venues, only spent about three months a year at Faywood. Bagby added the two forbidding granite eagles that guard the family plot along the entrance from Old Frankfort Pike and a couple of marble statues, evoking a Roman senator and a servant, that sit just outside the main office.

In 1969, after Mr. Bagby’s death, the farm was sold to Carl T. Fisher. By this time the original farm had been whittled down to 410 acres. On August 29, 1997, Mr. and Mrs. Trontz began the transition from Faywood to Hopewell, from farming to Thoroughbreds. Three of the tobacco barns and the mule barn were converted to Thoroughbred facilities and four additional barns were constructed. Phil Gerrow, a Midway architect and renovationist, was hired to reconstruct the mansion. The utilities were buried, roads were paved and paddocks and fields were partitioned with superior four-plank fencing. The 18th century stone wall along Old Frankfort Pike, which was originally constructed by Irish immigrants and had fallen into disrepair, was reconstructed. Three new entrances, artistically echoing the limestone walls, were added.

In March 2000, Mr. Trontz acquired 177 contiguous acres on which he built an additional barn along with roads and fencing. It wasn’t until the summer of 2002 that the main house was ready to handle the offices of Hopewell Farm and Mr. Trontz’s other business, the Bluegrass Bloodstock Agency.

The property is also home to a variety of trees and plants – oaks, hedge apples and willows, among them. Wild carrots and rhubarb also dot the earth along the miles and miles of paddock fencing. Mr. and Mrs. Trontz, both very respectful of Hopewell’s storied past, have been very careful to preserve the flora and the historical sites that add meaning and depth to their Thoroughbred operations.

Now, Hopewell Farm is also home to stars such as Horse of the Year Skip Away and Souvenir Copy, both sires of multiple stakes winners. An abundance of classy mares are now in foal to Hopewell stallions, such as Royal Anthem and Crafty Friend. When appropriate, they are also sent to other sires, including 2000 Kentucky Derby winner, Fusaichi Pegasus. What distinguished Hopewell Farm in the Thoroughbred industry is its respect for the past without letting those ties restrain them from surging toward the future with the same quiet intensity that’s suggested so eloquently by its trademark

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