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By Betsy Burke Parker

The obituary in the local newspaper is complete, of course, well-written and respectful. But if you knew Virginia-based thoroughbred owner-breeder Sara Collette at all – even just by reputation, it smacks a little flat.

It’s a two-dimensional chronicle of this pixie-sized, multi-dimensional force of nature.

Yes, Sara Collette was 86 when she died Oct. 11, yes she bred two Virginia Gold Cup winners, yes she hunted with Casanova, yes she leaves behind her husband of 66 years, an assortment of survivors and a farm she loved.

But the rote write-up of her life didn’t capture the vivacity of Sara Collette’s ardent support of her beloved homebreds over nearly 35 years on the racecourse. It doesn’t express her enthusiasm following the second careers of Pageland-breds that went on to excel in other disciplines. And it definitely doesn't reveal the grace with which she handled the final chapter of her life. 

To hear Sara Collette’s story – from her childhood in New York with adoptive parents and a horse she adored as a teen, to that time she allowed a handsome Cornell classmate to lug her luggage dozens of city blocks as they fruitlessly searched for a non-existent address – is an inspiring narrative of an ordinary person that lived an extraordinary life.

Like any well-ordered obituary, as in life, there’s a beginning, a middle and an end.

Sara Collette’s story is no different.

We already know the end of her tale: Healthy almost all of her 86 years, the past 12 months were tough on her, rough on her family and hell on Bruce.

She had Parkinson’s disease, and it made her frail and weak. She was good – great, even, until the last year or so, Bruce says. But the last year was hard.

Bruce says he was all but housebound along with Sara, caregiving and catering to his wife as their evening strolls shrunk from walking the entire length of their long farm driveway, visiting horses in adjacent pastures as they went, to walking halfway, then a quarter-way, then around the porch, then to just looking out the window.

It made her sad. It made him sad. But that's just how it was, the new normal as they adjusted to the unfairness of old age. 

“For a while, we’d go to the 10th tree, one of the sycamores I’d planted,” Bruce says. “Then she was in a wheelchair and we’d do the circle in front of the house, then around the porch, then halfway.

“Sara just kept pushing. The Parkinson’s was so hard, but she wanted to keep fighting it.”

They had a wonderful doctor that made house-calls, which helped a lot, Bruce adds.

“She kept fighting and fighting, but, god damn it, it just wore her out.”

She died Oct. 11 at her home on Pageland Farm near tiny Casanova, Virginia. She’d hoped to go to the Oct. 9 Virginia Fall Races at Glenwood Park, but she was just too weak. “She wanted to watch (homebred) Eryx. She loved all her horses, so much. It was so much a part of her.

“After me and our daughters, horses were the biggest part of her life.”

Sara and Bruce were fixtures on the circuit, paddockside and railside when their horses were running. She knew horses and she knew bloodlines. She personally researched pedigrees and nicks to select the best matches for her program.

“A lot of thought went into it,” says trainer Madison Meyers, who has the last homebred Sara Collette saw race – Eryx. “She bred exactly for what she wanted – jumpers. She didn’t breed for the flat track and hope they’d get a second career as a steeplechase horse.

“Her horses could be late-maturing, which wouldn’t interest a lot of people. Every one of them with big, open gallops and most were very good jumpers.

“You’d say that makes her a success in the breeding industry, no matter what level. You breed for what you want, and you get it.”

Virginia Steeplechase Association secretary and race-caller Will O’Keefe echoes the appreciation for the Pageland program. “Sara was the epitome of a small (scale) Virginia breeder,” O’Keefe says. “The most incredible example of her breeding program was Zanclus, who won the Virginia Gold Cup in 2018 – Sara not only bred the dam (Jordani) but also bred the sire (Xenodon).”

That's a triple-play even mega-successful, large-scale, world-famous owner-breeders Paul Mellon and George Strawbridge haven't replicated.

Though he was sold to Irv Naylor as a timber prospect after failing to impress over hurdles, the Collettes also bred Salmo (as well as Salmo's dam, Melantha), 2007 and 2009 Virginia Gold Cup winner.

Sara Elizabeth Foster was born March 1, 1935, in New Haven, Oswego County, New York.

She studied anthropology at Cornell University, and it was there that she met her future husband, Bruce Collette.

Bruce tells the amusing tale of how they sparked. It took a bit of work on his part.

“Sara’s roommate was some sort of zoologist, and I was studying herpetology, so we of course knew each other,” Bruce recalls. “So, my roommate had a car, and he was always wanting to load up with passengers to help pay for the gas.

“My parents lived on Long Island, and Sara’s mother lived downtown, so that was an easy sell. I remember one trip there, Sara and I were in the backseat, talking the whole way. When we got into town, it seemed gallant to offer to walk her home.

“I was lugging her suitcase, blocks and blocks while we tried to find the new address of her mother.

“We finally found it, but that was a long walk.”

But, evidently, it sealed the deal.

Back at Cornell, Sara and Bruce started going steady. They’d study together in the evenings, and it was then that Bruce realized Sara was more than just a pretty face.

“I’d get through a single page of whatever book I was studying, and I’d hear ‘flip, flip, flip’ of Sara going through pages and pages. She was just like that – so smart, and a really good student,” Bruce says.

He was able to do what he did – build a worldwide reputation as a leading research scientist, because of the partnership they built, Bruce says. “I wrote more than 400 papers, and this was only possible because Sara did everything else for our family. She raised the kids, she took care of the house. Everything.”

After their girls were a little older, Sara got back into riding, buying a saddle horse and boarding at the old Woodlawn Stable in Alexandria.

It was good, but not ideal.

“One day, I thought I had a brilliant idea,” Bruce recalls spinning the family into the next chapter of their lives. “So, we’re paying to board this horse, and she had to drive to go ride. Why don’t we just move a little farther out of the city, I said, buy a farm and save some money.

“Ha.”

The Collettes purchased Pageland Farm in the mid-1970s. Near neighbors included thoroughbred breeding establishments Spring Hill Farm and Buckland Farm. That, and the fact that Casanova Hunt huntsman Tommy Lee Jones and his father both had racehorses played a role in the Collettes getting involved in racing.

Sara hunted with Casanova, but she hurt her back and decided to get a mare in foal as a diversion. They purchased Flower Bow via agent Mike Hughes at the Ocala mixed sale.

The daughter of Russian-bred Zabeg was in foal to Cruise On In. She became their foundation mare.

Though the Cruise On In foal never got to the track, Flower Bow produced jump winners Genghis, Yadkin and Melantha. Melantha in turn produced Salmo, who went on to win two Virginia Gold Cups for Irv Naylor.

“I marveled at her breeding theory,” Bruce says, remembering how Sara would spend hours, days, weeks researching pedigrees and determining cover sires for her broodmares. Bruce’s main role was naming the foals. He chose Latin genus names. “A different letter of the alphabet every time,” he says. “I think we went through the alphabet three times. That’s a lot of foals.”

Though Sara is gone, Bruce says her legacy lives on. Homebred Eryx (a full brother to Zanclus) races at Saturday’s International Gold Cup meet, and there’s a 2022 foal on the way. Getaway is a daughter of Skip Away. She’s in foal on a May cover to West Virginia stallion Golden Years. “We’ll see what we get,” he says. “I wish Sara was here to see it, too.”

 Bruce says it’s weird, being without Sara after all those years. The house feels empty, especially this week after his daughters went home to their own families and lives, and most of his colleagues have stopped dropping in.  

“It’s quiet,” he says. “We’ve got the urn with her ashes. At her wishes, we’ll spread them on the front field out here next spring.

“She wants to be part of Pageland forever.

“And she will be.”

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Virginia Point-to-Point Foundation. Condolences may be offered at moserfuneralhome.com.

Madison Meyers’ husband, 2016 NSA champion rider Kieran Norris had a close, personal relationship with Sara Collette, one that went far deeper than employer-employee.

He credits Pageland for helping him win the rider title.

“Her winners were a big part of that year,” Norris says. “We’d talk about her horses all the time, and she knew, she just knew, what they needed. She could tell me what they’d do before they’d do it.

“She was a very intelligent woman, and a real pleasure to talk to.

“Every time I saw her the past year, she’d always ask me about (our now-1-year-old daughter) Charlotte. She was so excited for us.”

Norris says he spoke to Sara a week before she died, talking pedigrees and plans.

Tara Elmore kept Virginia Gold Cup winner Salmo in his retirement. “I have tons of good stories about that amazing soul,” Elmore says of her years with the big chestnut. Salmo was by Northern Baby out of Collette foundation mare Flower Bow. “When Salmo was 4, I saw him at Middleburg. I walked up to Sara – I was a kid, and I said I was going to own him one day.

“She looked at me and smiled and said ‘then he could have both of our hearts.’

“We always talked of him after that, and she’d always tear up asking about him. I’d do the same, and we’d stand there crying at the races! She loved her horses.”

Erica Keller Thomas had a Collette-bred – Dancing Scot – she made into a field hunter, then sold to Ellie Shapiro to lead the field in the stiff Elkridge-Harford country in Maryland.

“Sara (and Bruce) had some great horse names. Most were scientific, and they went alphabetically. My favorite H was called Holy Halibut. Not scientific, but (he was) a cool little guy.”

Brandon Barry galloped racehorses for Doug Fout and hunted the MOC Beagles, both of which gave him a lifelong passion for the thoroughbred horse. 

When he had a chance to obtain a Collette homebred – Auxis, sired by Collette homebred Xenodon out of the Ned Evans-bred Fully Bent, Barry was intrigued.

“I knew she’d bred quite a few really good steeplechasers,” Barry says. “So, I believed the horse has the potential to be a decent jumper.” 

He was hoping for a horse he could bring along in the hunt field, and one that might make into a pony club horse and lower-level eventer for his three kids, ages 15, 13 and 5. 

“Auxis – we call him Tuna, because that’s a type of tuna, has proved to be all that,” Barry says. “He was nervous at first because he’d been turned out at the farm for years, not doing anything. But he was put back in work this summer, and now he’s hunting first-flight.

“And he loves it! Totally loves it! It’s like he was just waiting for this chance to shine.

“I didn’t know Sara Collette, but I appreciate everything she did with her breeding program. This horse is a great example of what she was aiming for.”

Lars Weichmann remembers the Collettes from his childhood. “She and her best friend, Pam Lindholm, were always kind enough to make sure I had a horse to foxhunt or pony club,” Weichmann recalls. “There are very few owner-breeders who were as hands-on as Sara. She knew everything about each and every one of her beloved homebreds, and she cherished and loved them all deeply.

“What a special lady and what a huge loss to us all.”

WATCH Sara Collette's Eryx at Saturday's International Gold Cup Races on the NSA website (NationalSteeplechase.com).