The 1916 winner, The Finn, had won the 1915 Belmont Stakes and earned American Champion Three-Year-Old Male Horse honors.
The only time a mare ever won the event occurred in 1931 when Valenciennes defeated a field of eight males for owner Fannie Hertz who also owned Reigh Count, the 1928 Kentucky Derby winner and American Horse of the Year.
[7] The 1938 running saw future Hall of Famer Seabiscuit put on a performance in the Havre de Grace Handicap that the New York Times described as "one of his most sensational victories."
Bumped so hard at the first turn by another horse that jockey George Woolf thought he was going down, Seabiscuit regained his stride, caught up with the field, then took the lead away from the outstanding runner Menow and from there was hand-ridden to victory in a time of 1:50 flat that was just 1/5 of a second off the track record.
[9] Sarah F. Jeffords very fast colt Natchez added a third track record to his racing resumé with his 1948 victory in which he ran the mile and one-eighth in a clocking at 1:49 2/5.