Annette Covault Passes Away

The breeding community lost a friend and asset last week. Annette Covault died Friday, Dec. 13, from complications of ill health that she had dealt with for several years.

As the booking secretary for Claiborne Farm first and then Gainesway Farm over several decades, Covault, known to her familiars as “Netto,” provided common sense and good humor to breeders and farm managers working through the prickly process of getting mares booked to stallions in a timely manner.

The stallion veterinarian at Gainesway from 2008 to 2019, Rocky Mason, DVM, noted that, “Annette elevated the horse industry; she was a consummate professional. With witty quips or prosing on the latest New Yorker article, she was always charming to be near. Annette looked after me like I was family, an attribute not celebrated enough in this world.”

In addition to serving breeders and farm managers, Covault would also be called upon to advise the hapless, wandering scribe in search of a story. When an editor would peek round the corner and say, “Mr. Prospector is dead. Check it out,” the call went out.

Annette Covault took those calls with good humor and would summarize the situation with a “few cogent comments,” like “He's standing up and grazing, but if you'd like to come take his pulse …” As booking secretary and general knower of things, Annette Covault looked out on the stallion paddocks at the historic nursery for more than 20 years.

Born in Fletcher, Ohio, Covault did not come from horse people. After graduating college, Covault moved to Kentucky in the mid-1970s, where she initially took a job with The Thoroughbred Record magazine. The publication and its printing press were both located on North Broadway in Lexington, in a little colony of racing and breeding people.

Heeding the call of her favorite horse, Secretariat, Covault moved her tack to Claiborne Farm.

“Mrs. Downing was looking to retire, I seem to recall,” said Dell Hancock, “and Annette came in to take her place. Mrs. Downing thought a lot of her and described Annette this way: Annette's a Brahmin,” a member of the highest class.

“She was a dedicated person, and she worked hard,” said Seth Hancock. “She dedicated her life to the work she was engaged in doing.”

Dedicated, competitive, and yet with a streak of humor, Annette was recalled in this story from Dell Hancock: “After Swale won the Derby, we were standing around and feeling pretty good, and John Sosby said, 'I think I'm responsible for Swale because I take care of the farm.' Then the broodmare manager said, 'I'm responsible because I took care of the mares.'

Then the foaling man said, 'I was responsible for him because I foaled the mare.'

“Then Annette said, 'Well, there wouldn't have been a Swale if I hadn't booked that mare on the right day.' She thought she had trumped everyone with that.

“But then Dr. Kaufmann said, 'I knew him when he was just a follicle.'”

Good humor helps to leaven a world of situations, including those that arise on a horse farm and with horse people.

Dealing with legendary breeders, such as the Whitneys, Alfred Vanderbilt, William Haggin Perry, and the Phippses, and working around horses like her beloved Secretariat, leading sires Nijinsky, Hoist the Flag, Danzig, and Mr. Prospector, Covault developed a cordial working relationship with these and many other owners and breeders involved in the daily process of breeding championship-quality racing stock year after year.

After Claiborne, Covault became booking secretary to Gainesway Farm, and in her decades-long specialty, Covault combined the delicate mix of qualities required of the position: uncommon diplomatic tact and a salty sense of humor.

“Annette brought a great reputation and years of experience to Gainesway,” said Michael Hernon, who was in charge of selling seasons at Gainesway at the time. “She was my cherished friend. Her word was her bond.”

Peter Blum had his horses at Claiborne in 1973 when he first met Covault. The longtime breeder even named a horse Netto (Honest Pleasure) in her honor.

“I got to know Annette very well,” Blum recalled. “She was extremely thoughtful and caring. She had a lot of friends. She cared about what she did and she was very good at what she did.”

Blum continued, “I think everyone who really knew Annette really liked her. She was just a really wonderful person. Even though she was very ill and I knew it was just a matter of time, it did affect me. It leaves me with a hole in my heart.”

Dr. Dede McGehee, horse breeder and owner of Heaven Trees Farm, summarized her experience.

“Annette, She was the best.”