When starting to investigate the David Dixon Handicap – sometimes a Gold Cup or a Sprint Trophy – it felt to me as if it had a longer existence than was really the case. In fact it was run at the Dante meeting from 1974 to 1986.
It transpired that it was a business sponsorship. In 1974 David Dixon & Sons were among a phalanx of new sponsors at York that inclued Terry’s, the chocolatiers whose factory was next to the racecourse. The David Dixon Gold Cup at that year’s Dante meeting was worth £5,000. The company had been woollen manufacturers in Leeds since at least 1894, but it appears they are no longer in business.