The Rhineland breed owes much of its modern shape and performance success to the vision of Maria and Gottfried Hoogen of Vogelsangshof in Kevelaer, not far from the Dutch border in the Rhineland. The documented history of horse breeding goes back 600 years! The young couple set out of breed warmbloods right in 1945, when times couldn't have been more difficult. Gottfried Hoogen found his foundation mare in front of a wagon delivering milk in the neighborhood, Mira, a chestnut Trakehner who was bred at the once great Zitzewitz-Weedern farm in East Prussia and who had survived the trek. The Mira-family produced outstanding sport horse sires like Marco Polo, Morgenglanz, or the elite stallions Michelangelo and Monteverdi TSF. But it was the chestnut Marke, who Mr. Hoogen bought in 1948, that would revolutionize not only the Trakehner breed (she is the foundation of Mahagoni, Marlon and Mackensen), but also the Rhineland breed through her son EH Mackensen, champion of his approval in 1978. Marke produced 11 colts, of which 6 ended up as approved stallion. This includes Markgraf, who was the first approved Rhineland stallion. EH Mackensen, whose offspring in the Trakehner bred won everything from CCI*** eventing to Grand Prix dressage, became a stamping sire for the Rhineland, and produced the approval reserve champion Mephistopheles. A year after his approval, he was also reserve champion of the 100 day test, and was the first Rhineland stallion to be stationed at the state stud in Warendorf. Today, Mephistopheles can be found in a majority of sport horse pedigrees, ranging from the dressage stallion Danny Wilde to the younger stars Fürst Piccolo and FS Louis le Bon, the Bundeschampion, all the way to the CHIO Sales top stallion Jaquare.

EH Mackensen	Mephistopheles

 

Danny Wilde	FS Louis le Bon

No less important, and another one of Gottfried Hoogen's visionary imports, was the black, Polish-bred Trakehner Patron. The stallion, who turned over 30 years old and sire more resgistered daughters in the Trakehner breed than any other stallion, is the sire of Mackensen, and also of the elite stallion Sokrates, whose success story is tightly connected to his home stud, the Klosterhof-Medingen in Lower-Saxony. For the Rhineland, it was Patron's excellent son Pasternak who proved to be of great quality. Ehrentusch has already been mentioned, but Pasternak also produced the approved Prinz Muthagen and a number of outstanding brood mares, who in turn became dams of influential sires.

Patron

The Hoogen trio of outstanding stallions for the Rhineland is completed by Rembrand, son of the Trakehner Rubin and out of a Burnus AAH-daughter, made a name for himself as sire of outstanding dressage talents. In the Trakehner breed, Rubin is the "other" arem of the great Flaneur line, and sired Majorn, himself the sire of the 1989 champion stallion Preussenprinz. Rubin was later exported to Canada, where his son Rubinesque is an accomplished Prix St Georg and approved ATA and Oldenburg stallion today. Rembrand's sons in the Rhineland include Rebel, Remarkable and Restorator as well as the mare Ronja, who with Mephistopheles produced Medusa, dam of the shooting star in Warendrof, Fürst Piccolo.

 

Rembrand	Rubin