Page 202 - Speedhorse September 2017

David Mackie Passes Away
David French Mackie, owner of 1998
All American Futurity winner Falling In Loveagain, passed away on Aug. 14. Mackie was born in 1937 in Kansas City, Kansas.
He graduated valedictorian of his class at Pembroke-Country Day school and then from Yale College, cum laude, in 1959. He served in the U.S. Navy until 1961, and then graduated from Yale Law School, cum laude, in 1964. He became a member of the Bar of California and joined the San Francisco law firm Brobeck, Phleger and Harrison, and began a legal and business career in the Federal administrative law and public utility business. He joined
the executive ranks of the El Paso Natural
Gas Company in 1970 in El Paso and then
in Houston, retiring as Senior Vice President and General Counsel in 1983. He joined
Transco Energy Company in 1984, retiring as President and COO in 1992. He then became an independent consultant and venture capital investor in the U.S. and Canada, co-founding AltaGas Ltd. In Calgary in 1994.
Mackie married Mary Lamora Harrison in 1962 and they adopted three children. He then married Susan Kemp Chism in 1989, with whom he acquired two daughters. David and Susan pursued the thrills of horse breeding and racing, with their win in the All American Futurity one of their greatest high- lights. Together with his friend Will Farish, Mackie also bred and raced Thoroughbreds, winning several Grade 1 events.
David is survived by many family members and friends and will be missed deeply by those who loved him.
Clayton Keys Passes Away
Longtime Oklahoma horseman Clayton Keys, 79, passed away on Aug. 2. Keys was born in 1937 in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, graduated from College High School, and attended Oklahoma A&M and Northeastern A&M. He married Dorothy Kay Jones in 1963.
His family owned a ranch in Ochelata, and his uncle was a steer roper who introduced Clayton to roping and riding at a young age. Clayton’s love of horses continued throughout his life. He showed horses, worked at racetracks, and trained and ran horses.
In 1966, he began work at Stan-D Ranch
as ranch manager, and then moved to Citation Farm in the 1970’s, where he stood such stallions as Champion sire Mr Meyers. In 1972,
Clayton, here with Bud Breeding, was inducted into the Oklahoma Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2013.
he moved to the All-American Sales Company, now the Ruidoso Sales Company, where he worked until 1997. Also during the 1970’s and 1980’s, he conducted two annual sales with his own company, Keys Sales Company, as well as other dispersal and race sales.
Keys began working for the Heritage Place Sales Company when they broke ground in 1978 and remained there until he retired in 2007. The late Robert Gentry, one of the original Heritage Place organizers and Board
of Director member, once said, “We were successful beyond anything we imagined and we couldn’t have done it without the direction of Clayton Keys.” Dr. Charles Graham, another original Heritage Place founding member, said, “There was never a time when Clayton wasn’t a
Clayton in 2007 with his bronze bust at Heritage Place
model of integrity, honesty, fairness, and heads- up professionalism.”
As a tribute to his influence in the industry, Keys was honored with a bronze bust in his image at Heritage Place in 2007. He was also inducted into the Oklahoma Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2013.
“I love the people in the horse business. I was born lucky in that all the horse people I knew helped me to learn,” Keys once said. We are the lucky ones, however, to have known Clayton and to have had his great influence in this industry.
Keys is survived by his wife Dorothy Kay, son Barry and wife Kristi, three grandchildren, and other family members and many friends.
200 SPEEDHORSE, September 2017
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