Page 21 - NMHBA Spring 2021

The 2019 Ruidoso prayer garden dedication attended by Jana Trotter, Wilma & Bill Elliott, Gerry Lynn & Stan Sigman, and Melanie & Darrell Winter
Thanks to individuals like Johnny Trotter, the late Stan Sigman and other race horse owners, the Ruidoso Downs Track chaplaincy is one of the largest and most successful in the country.
suggested he draw them in by cooking them hamburgers. Trotter donated the meat and his wife Jana, and her mother Pat Green helped Winter do the cooking.
Trotter has built a hugely successful conglomerate of businesses in ranching, banking, trucking and cattle. His Big-G Feedyard is one of the largest feedlots in Texas. He considers his venture into horse racing another path to fulfilling his faith- based DNA.
“I’ve always believed that God led me to the horse racing industry to do his will and support the race track chapel,” said Trottter.
Winter didn’t start out to be a chaplain.
He was born in Indiana, the son of William and Helen Winter. His dad was an insurance underwriter and in his youth the family moved first to Atlanta and then New Orleans. Darrell was 13 when his parents decided to send him to live with his Uncle Jack and Aunt Dorothy in Minnesota.
“I started getting in a little bit of trouble. Normal teenage stuff like sneaking out of the house,” says the chaplain. “It was enough that they realized if I continued in that vein, it would continue to get worse.”
Jack Winter was a preacher and taught at Bethany College. Darrell spent that summer helping his uncle at his church and summer camps around the state. He ended up staying in Minnesota through his high school years, then enrolled at Bethany College, where he earned an associate degree in missionary work.
After graduation he owned a couple of small businesses, then worked in management for a grocery business. He retired at age 39 and, with his wife Melanie and their three kids, moved to Ruidoso.
Uncle Jack apparently knew where Darrell’s life was headed.
“A few years after I moved to New Mexico and was skiing and doing things I enjoyed, he told me, ‘God’s not going to let you retire.’
My uncle knew what I was trained to do,” says Winter. “Even though I didn’t put that into use during my (business) career, I found that God was calling me into ministry in my retirement years.”
By then, Winter had started volunteering at different churches and was the interim youth pastor at First Baptist Church. “That’s when it started to get serious,” says Darrell.
So, when the chaplain’s position at the racetrack opened up, he applied. The track’s president, Bruce Rimbo, attended First Baptist and had asked the minister there if he knew of someone who would be interested in the chaplaincy.
Winter interviewed with Rick Baugh,
the track general manager. Perhaps the best recommendation for the job came from Baugh’s teen-age son Ben, who at the time was a member of Winter’s mountain bike club.
“Darrell’s the guy for you,” Ben told his dad.
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