I have found from experience that my first name -- Darley -- seems unusual to many people I meet. Frequently I have to repeat the name and sometimes even have to spell it out. It's a family name -- my great uncle's middle name and, I believe, my great, great grandmother's maiden name. Before that I couldn't say, but it does go back a ways. In my family, I am the only person to have "Darley" as a first name. Just between us, aside from all the family stuff surrounding it, I really like my name because of its association with the Darley Arabian.

Could any of my family roots be followed back to Thomas Darley of England? I couldn't say. From Google, there seem to be tons of people with Darley as a last name in England. Thomas Darley, however, was the man who, in 1704, bought an Arabian horse from Syria -- the so called Darley Arabian -- that became one of the three foundation sires of the Thoroughbred breed of horses.

Of the three foundation sires, the Byerly Turk, the Godolphin Arabian and the Darley Arabian, the Darley Arabian is considered to be the most important. The Darley Arabian bloodline is thought to be present in approximately 90% of today's Thoroughbred racehorses, including Secretariat, the 1973 Triple Crown Winner.

Thomas Darley and I probably do not have anything like the shared bloodline of his Arabian and most racing thoroughbreds in common. It is likely that all we share is probably just the wonderful coincidence of names and a passion for horses. Somehow that's enough for me.