| Dawn Wofford | |
| Nationality: | British |
| Birth Date: | May 23, 1936 |
| Birth Place: | Kidderminster, Worcestershire, England |
| Death Place: | Studley, Warwickshire, England |
| Sport: | Equestrianism |
Dawn Palethorpe Wofford (23 May 1936 – 12 June 2015) was a British equestrian.[1] [2] She competed at the 1960 Summer Olympics and tied 20th at the final rankings.[3] [4]
Wofford was born in Kidderminster, Worcestershire, in 1936, and was brought up in Blakedown.[4] She learned to ride from a very early age, and was also a swimmer and played tennis.[1] At the age of two, she joined the Pony Club and was the runner-up in the 1951 Junior Show Jumper of the Year.[1] She attended Edgbaston Ladies College and the Birmingham School of Music.[4] In 1954, Wofford was the Ladies National Champion.[1] In 1955 and 1956, she won the Queen Elizabeth II Cup at the Royal International Horse Show.[4] In 1959, she won second place in the German Grand Prix Tournament held in the Halls of Westphalia with her horse Hollandia.[5] She married her husband, Warren, in secret in 1957.[4]
Wofford was selected to take part at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Stockholm, but did not compete.[6] At the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Wofford competed in the individual jumping event, where she tied for 20th place.[7] Just prior to the Olympics, Wofford won a silver medal at the European Women's Championships in Copenhagen.[8]
Following the Olympics, Wofford retired from show jumping.[1] In 1991, Wofford became the first ever female chairperson of the Pony Club.[1] The following year, she re-wrote the Manual of Horsemanship, the key document of the Pony Club.[9] [10]
Her brother-in-laws Jimmy and John both competed at the Olympics,[11] [12] as did her father-in-law John W. Wofford.[13] In 2013, Wofford was diagnosed with bone cancer,[14] and she died in June 2015 at the age of 79.[15] [16]