Grove City, OH — The perfect match between charity and horse was at the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association’s charity night Saturday (June 8) at MGM Northfield Park.

By The Dawn’s Early Light celebrated winning a $10,000 donation from the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association. JJ Zamaiko Photography.

By The Dawn’s Early Light, a charity that makes positive impacts and helps to bring normalcy to a foster child’s life that is directly affected by addiction, was teamed with Clearlydreamy, whose owner has 11 adopted siblings, all stemming from foster care. By The Dawn’s Early Light took home the top prize of $10,000 from the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association.

A total of nine charities benefited from the generosity of Ohio horsemen.

The charities participating in the event were paired with a horse in Saturday’s sixth race. Each charity received a donation from the OHHA for participating, with the top three finishers receiving larger donations. First place received $10,000, second place received $5,000, and third place $3,000. All other finishers received $2,000 donations.

Clearlydreamy with Dan Noble took the pocket trip behind The Dragon Queen and Jason Bartlett. At the top of the stretch, Noble swung Clearlydreamy wide and started the charge down the lane, getting up at the wire to win by a neck.

John Conaway represented By The Dawn’s Early Light in the winner’s circle cheering on Clearlydreamy. When the 4-year-old mare crossed the finish line, Conaway jumped up on the wall of the winner’s circle to hug charity founder Dawn Scherma.

“I am in tears and still in shock,” said Scherma. “We have 3,800 children on our roster, and this will do so much to help them with birthday presents, Christmas presents, diapers, and hygiene items.”

Scherma says the donation will also help assist children who will be aging out of the foster care program.

Clearlydreamy’s part owner Rod Allums Jr. said it was a weird coincidence they were paired with By The Dawn’s Early Light.

“My mom was beyond ecstatic that our horse ended up getting this charity. I have 11 adopted siblings all stemming from foster care, there are 18 of us in total.”

Allums says the adopted and foster kids range in age from seven months to 20 years old.

Allums’ mother Sheila Mobus said it was ironic that the horse was teamed with this charity and then to have it win was even better. Mobus says fostering the children is so rewarding.

“I get to see the children’s happy faces all the time. They are great kids in bad situations and if more people fostered children we would have less of this.”

The Dragon Queen finished second, earning the Akron Canton Food Bank $5,000 while Do Me Better with Ronnie Wrenn Jr. finished third for the Geauga County Library Foundation which received $3,000.

The other charities represented were the First Tee Cleveland, Happy Trails Farm Animal Sanctuary, Kent State University Geauga and Twinsburg Academic Center, The Emergency Assistance Center, The LCADA Way, and Lutheran Metropolitan Ministry.

A total of $30,000 was donated to the charities by the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association.