Special Eclipse Award

On January 18, when the Eclipse awards are handed out, a special one will be presented to Monique Koehler, founder of the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, the nation's largest equine rescue program. This is significant not only because Ms. Koehler is most deserving, but also because it is a public acknowledgement of the validity of her work.

Ms. Koehler, who lives in New Jersey, founded the organization in 1982, after she became interested in the plight of retired racehorses who did not have second careers in the breeding shed or in the show ring. There are currently 1,200 horses in the program, at TRF-operated farms around the country, including those in Kentucky, New Jersey, Maryland, Florida, Virginia and New York.

The farm in New York at the Wallkill Correctional Facility is the site of the first vocational training program in equine care and management for the inmates. It has recently been replicated at the Blackburn Correctional Facility in Kentuky, the Marion County Correctional Facility in Florida and other prisons in South Carolina, Indiana, Maryland and Massachusetts.

It is worth noting that Koehler's involvement with horses stemmed from her interest in humane causes; she was not involved with the sport except as a casual fan.

"I am very honored and humbled to have been selected as a recipient of this year's Special Eclipse Award," she noted. "It has been a wonderful and fulfilling journey and I am able to take a large measure of satisfaction in what the TRF has been able to accomplish, and the thousands of horses we have saved, the many thousands more whose rescue, rehabilitation, or adoption we have facilitated, and the men, women, and children whose lives we have changed for the better through our pioneering vocational training programs."