England’s Tattersalls December sale series ended Thursday with robust gains in all financial categories.

The December sale included yearling, weanling, and breeding stock sessions. All told, these grossed about $117,523,060 for 1,444 horses, resulting in an $81,387 average price and a $34,398 median. Compared year-to-year in the auction’s guineas currency, gross receipts rose 29 percent from last year’s total for 1,398 horses, while the average and median prices were up by 25 percent and 24 percent, respectively.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Arnold Kirkpatrick, a Lexington realtor and former Thoroughbred Record editor died Tuesday night at Bourbon Community Hospital in Paris, Ky. He was 70.

Kirkpatrick, a realtor specializing in horse farms since 1984, previously was executive vice president of Spendthrift Farm from 1980 to 1984 and president of the racetrack operator Kentucky Jockey Club from 1981 to 1984. The Kentucky Jockey Club operated Latonia Race Course, now Turfway Park.

England’s Tattersalls December breeding stock sale, which sold four horses for more than 1 million guineas at its second session Tuesday, came down to earth Wednesday for its next-to-last session. But figures continued to run ahead of last year’s returns.

Sarah and Ken Ramsey, whose homebred Stephanie’s Kitten won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf this year, have won the inaugural John Deere Award as the leading breeders in the Breeders’ Cup Challenge Series.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Keeneland has cataloged 1,594 horses to its upcoming January all-ages sale, which will take place here January 9-12. The number is down almost 13 percent from last year’s 1,827-horse catalog.

The auction’s 2012 edition consists of 721 broodmares and broodmare prospects, 587 yearlings by 176 sires, 265 racing-age horses, 20 stallions or stallion prospects, and a share in Lemon Drop Kid. The in-foal mares represent 186 covering sires.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Denali Stud in Kentucky has formed what Denali owner Craig Bandoroff called “a strategic alliance” with Vivien Malloy’s Edition Farm in New York, the two nurseries announced Wednesday.

Chief Seattle, who led Indiana’s sire rankings in 2010, died in October at age 14.

A Seattle Slew horse, Chief Seattle stood at Lake Shore Farm in Scottsburg, Ind., where staff found him dead in his paddock on Oct. 28, according to farm manager Gale Bess.

Chief Seattle finished second in the 1999 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and Champagne Stakes in his four career starts. As a sire, he is best known for getting record-setting Canadian champion Shillelagh Slew, Grade 2 winner and millionaire Bold Chieftain, Grade 2 winner Seafree, and overseas champions Free Race and Sophia Slew.

Sumora, the dam of Group 1-winning juvenile Maybe, led a parade of high-priced fillies and mares Tuesday in the Tattersalls December breeding stock sale's second session in England.

Coolmore's M.V. Magnier paid 2.4 million guineas, about $3,931,200, for Sumora.

Last year’s Canadian champion turf mare, Miss Keller, is retired after selling Monday in England at the Tattersalls December breeding stock sale’s first mare session. The four-day auction in Newmarket, England, kicked off with strong gains across the board.

Robert Louis Green, the former manager of Elmendorf Farm and Greentree Stud in Kentucky, died on Nov. 20 in Mt. Sterling, Ky. He was 86.