First female Kentucky Derby jockey Diane Crump dead at 77

Diane Crump, the first woman to compete in the Kentucky Derby as a jockey, died this week at the age of 77. 

Crump was diagnosed in October with an aggressive form of brain cancer and died Thursday night in hospice care in Winchester, Virginia, her daughter, Della Payne, told The Associated Press.

In 1969, she became the first woman to ride professionally in a horse race and, a year later, she became the first female jockey in the Kentucky Derby. It would be 14 more years before another woman would ride in the event. 

Only four others have raced in it since then. 

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Crump won 228 races before her last race in 1998, a month shy of her 50th birthday and nearly 30 years after her trailblazing ride at Hialeah Park in Florida Feb. 7, 1969.

Crump was among several women to fight successfully at the time to be granted a jockey license, but they still needed a trainer willing to put them in a race and then for the race to run. Others were thwarted when male jockeys boycotted or threatened to boycott if a woman was riding.

The president of Churchill Downs Racetrack, Mike Anderson, said in a statement Friday that Crump "will be forever respected and fondly remembered in horse racing lore."

He noted that Crump, who had been riding since age 5 and galloping young thoroughbreds since she was a teenager, "was an iconic trailblazer who admirably fulfilled her childhood dreams."

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Chris Goodlett of the Kentucky Derby Museum said, "Diane Crump’s name stands for courage, grit and progress. Her determination in the face of overwhelming odds opened doors for generations of female jockeys and inspired countless others far beyond racing."

After retiring from racing, Crump settled in Virginia and started a business helping people buy and sell horses.

In later years, she took her therapy dogs, all dachshunds, to visit patients in hospitals and other medical clinics. She visited some with chronic illnesses regularly for years.

Payne said when her mother went into assisted living a month ago, she was already "quasi-famous" in the medical center because of how much time she had spent there, and a "steady stream" of doctors and nurses came to see her. One of the last people to visit her was the man who mowed her lawn.

Her daughter said Crump would never take "no" for an answer, whether it was becoming a jockey or helping someone in need.

"I wouldn’t say she was as competitive as she was stubborn," Payne said. "If someone was counting on her, she could never let someone down."

Late in life, Crump had her favorite fundamental characteristics tattooed on her forearms — "Kindness" on the left, "Compassion" on the right.

Crump will be cremated, and her ashes interred between her parents in Prospect Hill Cemetery in Front Royal, Virginia.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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