by Ellen Harvey, Harness Racing Communications

Freehold, NJ — When 2-year-old pacer Wink And Nod steps on the track at Harrah’s Chester Casino & Racetrack on Thursday (July 22) in a $22,000 division of the Pennsylvania Stallion Series, it will mark a homecoming of sorts for co-owner Joy McReynolds. The son of Western Hanover-Don’t You Smile, with a second-place finish in the Reynolds Stakes in his only start, is also the portal into a whole new world for her husband, Bluegrass music legend Jesse McReynolds.

Photo courtesy of Grand Ole Opry

Joy and Jesse, and their dog Yeller, singing at the Grand Ole Opry.

Joy McReynolds, a native of West Chester, Pennsylvania was a caretaker at Brandywine Raceway, near Wilmington, Delaware, just a few miles from Chester, in the early 1970s. She later worked with her then-husband Vincent Aurigemma training several high profile horses on the New York circuit in the ’70s and ’80s. Notable among them was Doc’s Fella (1:54.1, $1,267,059, 273-75-64-32 over 11 years).

“I had two horses in the paddock every Saturday night and thinking back, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world,” McReynolds said. “Old Doc’s Fella got claimed away from us after earning $1 million, so that was hard. But Vincent and I scraped up the money to buy him back and the Standardbred Retirement Foundation helped us find him a home.”

The Aurigemmas also campaigned Skip By Night (1:55.3h, $514,132, 86-20-17-14) and Division Street (1:52.3f, $1,222,552, 113-46-18-15), both sources of fond memories.

“The memories of Skip By Night getting a standing ovation from the tough New York crowd after winning in 1:55.3 (a track record) and taking Division Street to Freestate Raceway and winning the Breeders Crown over On The Road Again (in 1985) are priceless. I wouldn’t take a million dollars for those memories.”

After Roosevelt Raceway, the Aurigemma’s base, closed in 1988, the couple tried its hand at other venues and in different careers. They eventually amicably divorced. Joy, a fan of Bluegrass music, became a reporter and ad salesperson for “Country Music News.”

“My first big festival in Woodstown, New Jersey featured Jim and Jesse and The Virginia Boys as the headliners,” McReynolds said. Jim and Jesse consisted of the late Jim McReynolds, a guitar player, his brother Jesse on the mandolin and their band.

“I interviewed them and got a great story. Years later, my sister ran into Jesse at a festival and he asked how I was doing. She told him I was going through a divorce. He asked if she thought I’d mind if he called me on the phone. She said no, I’d probably enjoy hearing from him. From then on, he called me every day until I married him (nearly 15 years ago).”

McReynolds went from a life centered around horses to one centered around music. Jesse McReynolds has been described as a mandolin wizard, who performed with his late brother Jim (www.jimandjesse.com) until the latter died in 2002. Still touring with his grandchildren singing and playing along, Jesse McReynolds also performs as part of the Grand Ole Opry, as he has done for 46 years, when not on the road. He created the intricate and hard-to-duplicate cross picking and split string styles of mandolin playing. A multiple Grammy award winner, he also played mandolin on The Doors’ “The Soft Parade” album.

Joy McReynolds said it wasn’t hard to convince her spouse that getting a racehorse would be a good idea. He said, “Whatever makes you happy, honey. He’s that kind of guy. I think he’s a bigger animal lover than me, really.

“Rich Stiles, an old friend and our first horse owner when we got into the business, e-mailed last October and announced he’d bought a pacing colt by the name of Wink And Nod and was kind enough to allow us to be a partner in the horse. Kevin Johnson trains the horse and is doing a great job.”

Living north of Nashville in Gallatin, Tennessee, the couple has yet to see their horse in person, but will catch him on satellite television Thursday.

“We’re very excited about that,” McReynolds said. “He’s a nice colt and all the reports we’ve gotten from Kevin Johnson, the trainer, say he’s handy and he learns fast. He’s not the biggest colt in the world; he’ll make up for it in being a little more clever. He’s moderately staked. The Little Brown Jug would be a big dream, like hitting the lottery. We’re going to make it a point to try. If my husband gets clear here and I can get clear here (McReynolds runs a wedding venue business on their farm) we’re going to try to get to see him.”

Wink And Nod was purchased as a yearling for $75,000 at the Lexington Selected Sale. He is the first foal out of the mare Don’t You Smile, who was a strong performer on the Ontario circuit and finished third in the 2005 She’s A Great Lady Stakes. Wink And Nod’s great-grandmother, Secret Passage, foaled 1992 North America Cup winner Safely Kept.

Photo courtesy of Jesse McReynolds

Bluegrass music legend Jesse McReynolds is working on a song in tribute to Wink And Nod.

Jesse McReynolds is an old hand with a horse, but new to harness racing.

“She’s more familiar with harness racing than I am,” he said. “I didn’t get into it until we got married, but I see quite a bit of it on TV. I was raised in the mountains in Virginia and we always had farm horses to do our work with and I’d ride them a lot, too. I’d take them to visit our grandfather, who lived across the mountain from us. My grandfather (Charles McReynolds) was a fiddle player and he played on the original RCA recordings in Bristol, Virginia in 1927. RCA came in and did recordings with Jimmy Rogers and the Carter Family. He was pretty well known as a champion fiddler in the area where we grew up, but he wasn’t a professional. For entertainment on Saturday night, we’d go to someone’s house and have music, mostly fiddle music.

“The mandolin and fiddle have a lot in common. They’re tuned the same way. I got interested in mandolin by hearing people play it on records and my brother bought a mandolin when he got out of the service in 1947. He bought a mandolin and he was going to play mandolin and I was playing guitar at that time. We started playing together as a duet and he wasn’t that interested in learning to play the mandolin, which I was, so we switched instruments. That was years ago, and I’m still learning,” he said with a laugh.

Jesse McReynolds is working on a song in tribute to their horse, but is somewhat stymied right now.

“With a title like ‘Wink and Nod,’ it’s been hard so far to come up with something that’s going to fit the name,” he said. “I recorded the song, ‘Run for the Roses,’ and I might have to use it in some way. So far, he’s looking good.”