History
The event was established in 1849, and it was originally restricted to fillies aged three. The inaugural running was won by Ellen Middleton, owned by the 2nd Earl of Zetland.
The present system of race grading was introduced in 1971, and the Yorkshire Oaks was subsequently classed at Group 1 level. It was opened to older fillies and mares in 1991.
The race has been sponsored by Darley Stud since 2006, and it is currently held on the second day of York's four-day Ebor Festival meeting.
The Yorkshire Oaks often features horses which ran previously in the Epsom Oaks. The first to achieve victory in both races was Brown Duchess in 1861, and the most recent was Alexandrova in 2006.
Read more about this topic: Yorkshire Oaks
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“When the coherence of the parts of a stone, or even that composition of parts which renders it extended; when these familiar objects, I say, are so inexplicable, and contain circumstances so repugnant and contradictory; with what assurance can we decide concerning the origin of worlds, or trace their history from eternity to eternity?”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“False history gets made all day, any day,
the truth of the new is never on the news
False history gets written every day
...
the lesbian archaeologist watches herself
sifting her own life out from the shards she’s piecing,
asking the clay all questions but her own.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“These anyway might think it was important
That human history should not be shortened.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)