Glengarry Field/ Cool Meadow and Fasig- Tipton

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Historical Marker #2439 in Fayette County commemorates Glengarry Field/ Cool Meadow, the second airport in Lexington, and Fasig-Tipton, America's oldest Thoroughbred auction company.

With the development of larger multi-engine aircrafts and the restrictions on runway lengths, Halley Field quickly became obsolete and a larger airport was needed.

In February 1930, the Airport Committee of the Board of Commerce leased the Glengarry Farm for a new, larger municipal airfield. The farm was owned by James Blythe Anderson and was located on Newtown Pike, five miles north of Lexington. The airport was built on the site of a Civil War Union army encampment and skirmish site. Glengarry Field was dedicated on July 12, 1935, and the name was later changed to Cool Meadow Field. It operated until the mid-1950s, when Bluegrass Field was built on US 60.

Formed in 1898 by William B. Fasig and Edward A. Tipton, Fasig-Tipton Co. is North America’s oldest Thoroughbred auction company. Its first headquarters was in Madison Square Garden (New York City) and they initially sold road-and-carriage horses as well as Thoroughbred and Standardbred racing stock.

During World War II, breeders could not freely ship yearlings across the country, so the Saratoga sale was put on hold. In 1943, Fasig-Tipton held the sale in a tent at Keeneland Race Course in Lexington. It was not until 1972 that Fasig-Tipton established its permanent Kentucky headquarters in Lexington.

The Hettinger family, led by Hohn Hettinger, was Fasig-Tipton’s majority shareholder after guiding the company through the industry struggles of the late 1980s. However in 2008, Synergy Investments Ltd., a Dubai-based company headed by Abdulla Al Habbai, purchased Fasig-Tipton. They have updated and modernized the sales facilities in Lexington, Saratoga, and Timmonium, Md., as well as increased its international profile.