A research center for Thoroughbred racing, breeding, and related subjects, the Keeneland Association Library is located at Keeneland Race Course near Lexington, Kentucky. Amelia King Buckley, who became librarian in 1953, has compiled an alphabetical author listing of the titles in this unique collection as of June 1, 1958. Begun in 1939 with a gift of 2,000 volumes from William Arnold Hanger, the library has grown with the addition of other gifts and purchases, and now comprises one of the finest collections in its field. The published catalog includes more than 900 monograph titles, more than 100 serial titles, selected sales catalogs, private studbooks, bound pamphlets, and a small amount of manuscript material. The volume is illustrated with photographs from the library's remarkable collection of 15,000 negatives taken by the late Charles Christian Cook, one of the first American photographers to specialize in racing scenes.
...a leaping departure in comprehensiveness, organizational format, and accessibility through indexing...A magnificent contribution to the study of American library history. --LIBRARIES & CULTURE ...a work of enormous and painstaking scholarship. --LIBRARY ASSOCIATION RECORD (UK)
In the December 30, 1967, edition of the weekly Thoroughbred trade publication, the Blood-Horse, was an announcement that took up one inch of space -- James E. "Ted" Bassett III had been named assistant to the president of the Keeneland Association. It was sandwiched between equally short news items about a handicapping seminar at an East Coast racetrack and a California vacation trip by a horse-owning couple. Bassett's new job, in his own words, "was not earthshaking news." More than four decades later, Ted Bassett is one of the most respected figures within the global Thoroughbred industry. He has served as Keeneland's president, chairman of the board, and trustee, playing a critical role in its ascendency as a premier Thoroughbred track and auction house. Bassett was also president of Breeders' Cup Limited during its greatest period of growth and has been a key architect in the development of the Sport of Kings as we know it today. Written in collaboration with two-time Eclipse Award--winning journalist Bill Mooney, Keeneland's Ted Bassett: My Life recounts Bassett's extraordinary journey, including his days at Kent School and Yale University, through his U.S. Marine Corps service in the Pacific theater during World War II, and as director of the Kentucky State Police during the turbulent 1960s. He helped found the College of Justice & Safety at Eastern Kentucky University, and his continuing service to the Marine Corps has gained him the highest honors accorded to a civilian. During his forty-plus years with Keeneland, Bassett has hobnobbed with hot walkers in the track kitchen, hosted the first visit by Queen Elizabeth II to a United States track, and participated in many of the most important events in the modern history of horse racing. With self-effacing humor, characteristic charm, and candor, Bassett describes his association with historic figures such as J. Edgar Hoover and Kentucky governors Albert B. "Happy" Chandler, Edward T. "Ned" Breathitt, and John Y. Brown; and his friendships with racing personalities D. Wayne Lukas, Nick Zito, Ron McAnally, Pat Day, and Joe Hirsch. Bassett shares details about difficult corporate decisions and great racing events that only he can supply, and about the formation of Equibase, the premier data collection agency within the Thoroughbred industry. He tells about his role as an international ambassador for racing, which has made him a highly influential figure on six continents. Bassett often describes his life as a fascinating blur. That "blur" and all its unique components are brought into sharp focus in a book that is as wide-ranging as it is personal, filled with a gold mine of firsthand stories and historical details. In addition to highlighting Keeneland's reputation as the jewel of the Thoroughbred industry, Bassett chronicles the business of racing and accomplishments of many prominent people in the horse world, and elsewhere, during the twentieth century.
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“Lee does a masterful job of telling the entire and real story of a racing star who overcame numerous obstacles . . . a book that you cannot put down!” —Brian Zipse, managing partner of Derby Day Racing On the morning of the 1979 Belmont Stakes, Spectacular Bid stepped on a safety pin in his stall, injuring his foot. He had impressively won the first two races—the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness—but finished third in the Belmont, most likely due to his injury, making him one win shy of becoming the sport’s third straight Triple Crown champion. But that loss did not prevent him from becoming one of horse racing’s greatest competitors. After taking two months to recover, the battleship gray colt would go on to win twenty-six of thirty races during his career, with two second-place finishes and one third. He was voted the tenth greatest Thoroughbred of the twentieth century according to Blood-Horse magazine, and A Century of Champions places him ninth in the world and third among North American horses—even ahead of the renowned Man o’ War. This horse biography tells the story of the honest and not-so-glamorous colorful characters surrounding the champion—including Bud Delp, the brash and cocky trainer who was distrustful of the Kentucky establishment, and Ron Franklin, the nineteen-year-old jockey who buckled under the stress and pressure associated with fame—and how they witnessed firsthand the splendor and triumphs of Spectacular Bid. Including contemporary newspaper accounts of Bid’s exploits and interviews with key players in his story, this is an encompassing look into the legacy of one of horse racing’s true champions.
A behind-the-scenes history of the Bluegrass State’s iconic sport. Horse racing and the Commonwealth of Kentucky are synonymous. The equine industry in the state dates as far back as the eighteenth century, and some of that history remains untold. The Seventeenth Earl of Derby made the trip from England to Louisville for the famed Kentucky Derby. Many famous African American jockeys grew up in the area but fled to Europe during the Jim Crow era. Gambling on races is a popular pastime, but betting in the early days caused significant changes in the sport. Hidden History of Horse Racing in Kentucky details the rich and the lesser-known history at the tracks in the Bluegrass State.
Bill Hartack won the Kentucky Derby five times, and seemed to hate every moment. "If only Bill could have gotten along with people the way he got along with horses," a trainer said. His impoverished upbringing didn't help: his mother was killed in an automobile accident; the family home burned down; his father was murdered by a girlfriend; and he was estranged from his sisters for most of his life. Larry King, his friend, said it was just as well Hartack never married, because it wouldn't have lasted. Hartack was one of racing's most accomplished jockeys. But he was an inveterate grouch and gave the press a hard time. At 26, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. Whenever the media tried to bury him, he would win another Derby. At the end of his life, he was found alone in a cabin in the Texas hinterlands. Drawn from dozens of interviews and conversations with family members, friends and enemies, this book provides a full account of Hartack's turbulent life.
Today’s Kentucky Derby is a multimillion-dollar spectacle involving corporate sponsorship, worldwide media coverage, and an annual citywide festival in Louisville. Over its nearly century-and-a-half history, the Kentucky Derby has grown to be one of the biggest sporting events of the year, attracting 150,000 spectators at the track and nearly 15 million television viewers on the first Saturday each May. But 1875, the year of the first Derby, was a different time. The Louisville Jockey Club track, which would one day bear the name “Churchill Downs,” was a small structure that might, on its best day, provide seating and standing room for 12,000 spectators. The grandstand was plain and functional and included a section reserved for bookmakers, whose trade was legal and who operated in the open. Perhaps most significantly, the majority of jockeys in the race were Black, in stark contrast to the present-day Derby, where participation by African-American jockeys is rare. In The First Kentucky Derby, racing historian Mark Shrager examines the events leading up to the first “Run for the Roses,” the unsuccessful effort that the winning owner might have made to rig the race for his preferred horse, and the prominent role played by African Americans in Gilded Age racing culture—a holdover from pre-emancipation days, when slaves were trained from birth to ride for their wealthy owners and grew up surrounded by the horses that would be their life’s work.
