You're listening to American Shadows, a production of I Heart Radio and Greyman miles from Aaron Minkey. Eddie Sweet had a nightmare the racehorse had groomed and lovingly cared for for the past couple of years, was running and running hard. Big Red, as Eddie affectionately called him, had opened up a large lead over the other horses and then, without warning, the chestnut horse fell. The next day, Eddie nervously watched the horses step onto the track for the running of the Belmont Stakes.

In the infield, people stood shoulder to shoulder, holding up signs. Good luck, Secretariat. One rat in sports bars across the country. People stopped to watch. Others gathered around their TV sets at home. The red colt, whose jockey wore white and blue silks, was America's horse. One by one, the horses were loaded into the starting gate, and Eddie and the enormous crowd in the stands around him collectively held their breath. The starting bell broke the silence and the gates flung open.

Horses surged forward, their hooves thundering on the track. By the time they reached the first turn, Secretariat and another front runner had set mind boggling times for the first quarter. Head to head, they galloped, leaving the rest of the field far behind. These horses had been rivals all year, and now it looked like a match race. Then Secretariat began to pull away by one, then two, and then three lengths. The Chestnut Colt increased his lead by ten lengths, then twelve, and the crowd screamed and waved their signs like banners.

Enthusiasts looked at their stopwatches and shook their heads in disbelief. Announcer Chick Anderson spoke louder as he called the race secretariat is blazing along. Spectators could barely believe what they were seeing. More blistering speeds and secretariats lead kept growing with each ground leading stride. Anderson's next call became one of the most famous in sports history. He yelled to be heard of the roaring crowd. Secretariat is widening now. He's moving like a tremendous machine. Eddie's heart pounded. He dreamed of this.

Stay on your feet, Red. Stay up, he cried. Secretariat and his jockey, Ron Turcotte, were all alone now 22 lengths and counting, no longer racing the other horses, it was them against the stopwatch. In a now famous photo, Turcotte looks over his shoulder to check teleprompter for secretariats time. As the crowd nearly drowned out Anderson's final call of the race, Secretariat crossed the finish line thirty one lengths ahead of the rest, shattering the race, record, track record and world record for the mile and a half distance on dirt by an incredible second and a half.

Labeled the Horse of the Century, Secretariat had just won the coveted Triple Crown, having swept the Kentucky Derby and Preakness in the weeks before.

To date, only 13 horses have ever accomplished that feat, beginning with one named Sahaptin in 1919 and secretariats time records for all three races still stand almost fifty years later. So for a few weeks back in June of 1973, everyone's attention turned from Watergate to a starting gate. Time magazine even featured a picture of the champion horse on the front cover of their June issue. Even now, you can't mention horse racing without talking about Secretariat. No other horse in history has ever captured the public's attention, nor racing enthusiasts hearts the way he did.

So much so that in 2015, the Virginia Department of Historic Resources actually named Secretariat's birthplace a historical site. But as any true racing fan can tell you, the sport of kings isn't all winner circles and roses. It's also home to its own fair share of darkness. I'm Lauren Borglum. Welcome to American Shadows. Horse racing is a world of its own. We associate it with the wealthy and affluent, and for the owners and trainers, that's often true.

Race horses aren't cheap and the better bred ones can sell for millions of dollars, not to mention the money that goes into training them and keeping them fit, or at least and fit enough to run. And while there are races with million dollar purses, there are limits to how many horses can run that race. Often there are requirements too, like age or prior winnings. 20000 race horses are typically born each year. Divide that by the number of well-paying races and you can see how not every horse comes out profitable.

Riding to victory usually nets jockey 10 percent of the winner's share. Second, third and fourth place get around five percent. That sounds pretty good in million dollar stakes races where the winner gets 49 percent of the total purse. For perspective, though, according to the Jockeys Guild, the average stakes race as of twenty seventeen was just under thirty thousand dollars. That means for a jockey riding the winner of an average stakes race, they get seven hundred and thirty five bucks.

And for every winner there are losers.

And while some races may draw only five or six horses, others draw fields as high as 22. If their horse finishes fifth or worse, jockeys average about 50 to 100 and ten dollars for their time that day. Basically, half of America's thoroughbred jockeys make less than thirteen thousand dollars a year. It's not an easy way to make a living. In the late 1990s, black jockeys who dominated the tracks were being squeezed out of the sport. Still, Isaac Burns Murphy was the best jockey of his day, winning 34 percent of his races.

Murphy rode in the Kentucky Derby 11 times and entered the winner's circle on three horses, Yochanan in 1884, Ryley in 1890 and Kingman in 1891, when the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame was created in 1955. Murphy was the very first jockey inducted. Sadly, women weren't accepted in the sport at all, at least not without their husband's permission. But in 1984, Laska Darnell entered her horse Elwood, in the Kentucky Derby under just her initials.

The best part they won. In 1969, jockey Diane Crump faced such opposition on the track that she needed a police escort just to get to the small office she had to use to change into her riding silks. Men shouted at her to go back to the kitchen and cook dinner. Some jockeys across the United States threatened to boycott the Derby if she rode. But ride she did, although she didn't win. Live your dream, Crump said during an interview.

Don't let anyone tell you that you can't or that you're not good enough. You are.

But for any jockey riding a one thousand five hundred pound, high strung animal hurtling toward a finish line at 40 miles an hour alongside up to twenty two other horses and riders is a dangerous business. The position in which jockeys ride perched over the horse and bent forward like a missile never rested on the saddle is a feat of core strength and balance. Horse racing is a wave of controlled chaos, really, and jockeys are the daredevils who risk their lives to ride it.

Typically, jockeys are sidelined with injuries about three times a year. If a jockey loses, their balance, gets bumped, or if the horse stumbles, they can find themselves flying at high speeds onto the rail or track. Landing on the rail is bad enough, but landing on the track means there's a risk of being trampled by racehorse hooves that strike the ground with three thousand pounds of pressure. In 1933, up and coming jockey Dominic Belize's mount veered off course during a race, throwing the twenty one year old rider off balance.

Belleci fell into the path of the other horses and died at the hospital five days later from excessive internal injuries. Jockey John Red Pollard was aboard fairness tests and the stakes race in nineteen thirty eight. Another horse slowed down in front of his causing fairness test to trip. She somersaulted onto the track and trapped Pollard beneath her. Although injured fairness test tried to stand at the same moment another horse attempted to jump over her, slamming into her. She fell again, crushing Pollard.

A second time, the horse miraculously recovered, but Pollard suffered a crushed chest, a broken arm, shoulder and ribs, a shattered collarbone, a concussion and a few internal injuries between 1930 and 1939. Nineteen jockeys died as the result of track injuries. Finally, in the late 30s, jockeys met in secret to discuss the formation of a group to help protect them in the event of injuries or if they were disabled due to an accident. On the track, unsympathetic track operators and trainers often blacklisted them for participating in such meetings.

Despite the objections, though, the Jockey Guild was formed in 1940 after famous rider Eddie Arcaro visited another injured jockey in the hospital. Arcaro, along with Red Pollard and thirteen others, set in motion new safety measures, including having an ambulance on the track, shorter post parades and cold weather, plus the use of goggles and helmets to name a few. The horses, though, sadly, they didn't have a guild. In his day, he was what trainers called a flat out flyer, and it's no wonder in 1912, old Rosebud won 12 of 14 starts and repeatedly clocked the fastest five furlongs of any two year old.

The following year, he won the Kentucky Derby by eight lengths, making it one of the most dominant wins in the race's history. His owner didn't retire the champion after his three year old season, though, or any season for that matter. You see, being a gelding, old rosebuds value was only based on what he could win, but to his trainer who worked with him every day. Old Rosebud was something more. But racing was and is a business.

So on May 17th of nineteen twenty two, old Rosebud stepped onto the track for his 80th start of low end race with a minuscule purse with each breath his ribs showed against his now dull mud colored coat. His ears flicked and he shuffled uneasily. Had once been a gentleman on the track. Not now, though. To the trained eye, it appeared that old Rosebud no longer enjoyed racing. Maybe the track was the last place he wanted to be.

He was eleven after all. He ran forth that day, probably much to the aggravation of anyone had bet on him. Just days later, old Rosebud was out on the track for a morning workout. He stumbled, bobbing his head low. Then he staggered to a halt, favoring his right front leg. Later that evening, a bullet ended old rosebuds life. He didn't receive a burial in a green pasture or in a race track and field, though now that would have prevented old Rosebud from earning one more paycheck for his owner.

The money offered by the local rendering plant along the back stretch, his trainer wept. Bred by her late husband, Black Gold was a promising three year old horse that Rosa Hutz refused to sell, not even for fifty thousand dollars. Owning a Derby horse had been her husband's dream, but he had died before the 1924 derby. It marked the fiftieth running of the race and was also the first year a gold trophy cup was offered. And for fans of the Derby, it was notably the first time my old Kentucky home was played as the horses entered the track.

In the stretch, the jet black colt was bumped hard, but recovered, he was a tough horse to get a clear path. His jockey swung black gold wide around the other horses while the crowd cheered. They poured on the speed and overtook the leader in the last seven yards to win an exciting day. Indeed, Mrs. Hutz retired the champion to stud later that year. It turned out black gold wasn't fertile, though. In return to racing at the age of six, however, he broke down in the stretch, and while he still managed to finish the race, black gold was euthanized before he ever left the track.

This is Hutz had her beloved horse buried at the 16th pole. In 1885, a Kentucky Derby winner, Joe Cotton, a horse that had been named after a bookie, met the same fate after tripping over two horses that had fallen in front of him. Then tragedy struck again in 1969. Dark Mirage was the darling of America. She'd swept everything before her and her three year old season. In her second race as a four year old, she injured a leg and never recovered.

Historically, the ratio of accidents per starts has been about two out of every 1000 races. Oddly enough, about one third of injuries that lead to fatalities happened off the track. And some horses have recovered when the outstanding horse in the area fractured a leg running in a pasture. Veterinarians were able to save him, and he lived many years after that, passing away at the ripe age of twenty four. But it's not just the injuries that make the sport dangerous.

Drugging has plagued horse racing since at least the 1930s. And according to one New York Times article from 1983, it existed even back then. Most famously, perhaps, was the 1968 winner of the Churchill Downs, a horse named Dancer's image known for their zero tolerance for any drug found in a horse's system. Churchill Downs found trace amounts of a drug in the blood of a winner named Bute. The drug they found was a pain reliever similar to aspirin with antihistamine properties in it and one that's allowed today.

But owner Peter Fuller claimed that it wasn't really the drug, the disqualified dancer's image. It was his own involvement in the civil rights movement, you see. Fuller was very outspoken about social issues and had donated over sixty two thousand dollars of the champion's winnings to Coretta Scott King just days after her husband, Martin Luther King Jr., was murdered after dancer's image retired, he was sold as a stud horse, living the good life until he passed away at the very old age of 27.

While it's always been part of the business to sell a horse breeding rights, horses that no longer produce foals or quality horses have often ended up in slaughterhouses, including at least one Kentucky Derby winner named Ferdinand. In 2006, the House of Representatives passed a bill making the selling or raising of horses for food illegal. The bill failed at the Senate, though, and the bill wasn't the first to fail either. Similar laws have been proposed several times since 1915, and while there are currently no slaughterhouses for horses in the United States, they're often sold to brokers who take the horses across the northern and southern borders in just one decade.

It's estimated that more than seven thousand five hundred American race horses were shipped to Mexico for slaughter. Fortunately, that hasn't been the fate of every horse that disappointed their owners on the track with the right amount of luck and guided by just the right hands. Some have even become legendary. Tom Smith first laid eyes on him after a race that settled down south and east Boston, the three year old colt had won an allowance race, a race that generally signifies the horses, won at least one previous race, but isn't good enough for higher paying stakes.

Race Company. The horse had won in the stifling heat and something about him trainer Tom Smith's attention. It certainly wasn't the brown horses looks. He had knobby knees and was quite small for a thoroughbred. It might have been his bloodline.

The horse was the grandson of the Great Racehorse Manowar, or it could have been how well respected the stable had been, Bougnat was. But it was neither of those things. Not really. It was pure intuition that told Smith this horse could be a champion. Smith convinced automobile magnate Charles S. Howard to buy Seabiscuit for just eight thousand dollars. He paired the horse with a red haired jockey named John Pollard, known as Red on the tracks. Pollard was an underdog jockey who'd suffered a brain injury and been left partially blind after a horse had kicked the rock into his head during a race when Smith offered him the job.

Pollard was a lot like Seabiscuit down and out. Jockey and horse developed a quick bond, Seabiscuit wasn't just a race horse to Pollard, either. The man loved him, often bringing the horse sugar cubes. It helped that the trainer, Smith, had what others thought of as unusual training methods. For starters, he didn't treat Seabiscuit like the typical racehorse. He allowed the colt to be in the company of other animals, fed him the best food that allowed him to sleep frequently.

Basically, he cared for Seabiscuit as though he were part of his family and Seabiscuit thrived on it. The unassuming brown colt started winning and winning a lot. Big state races brought in the best horses and gamblers with the limitations on gambling. Betting at the tracks had become popular during the Great Depression. Some looked at winning at the track as a way out of poverty. To them, plain looking Seabiscuit stood out among the bigger, flashier horses. His jockey and trainer were underdogs in their own right.

In a way, they were the team of the working class and the poor. Before Smith and Pollard had taken charge of him, Seabiscuit had been raced and wept far too often, mistreated and discouraged. The horse didn't even bother to try anymore. But Pollard, Smith and Howard had given him a new chance in treating him well. In tough times. The Bay Colt gave people hope. His victories became their victories. New owner Charles Howard saw this and gave the people more of what they wanted.

Reporters who wrote about Seabiscuit were sent champagne. Before long, Seabiscuit was getting more press than President Roosevelt and Adolf Hitler. Shops began to sell Seabiscuit themed hats and toys. His image adorned cleaning services, hotels and pinball machines. Movie theaters played real footage of Seabiscuit races. He even appeared on crates of oranges. Seabiscuit earned it to the horse that had once been regulated to allowance. Races had gone on to win a string of handicaps state races. In 1937, he beat the best of the best.

Well, except for one horse 1937 Triple Crown winner War Admiral. That horse was owned by the famous racing tycoon Samuel Riddle, and Riddle, coincidentally, had also owned the legendary Manowar Seabiscuit scran sire. But despite Seabiscuit recent victories in his prestigious grand sire, Riddle scoffed at the horse as far as he was concerned, Seabiscuit was beneath his horse and a match race between them would be a waste of his time and more admiral's talent. But Howard persisted, and the public kept clamoring for the match.

Finally, Riddle agreed, but only under certain conditions. He got to pick the track. And since war, Admiral didn't like starting Gates, they'd use a starting line instead. Team Seabiscuit agreed the match race was finally set. It would be November 1st, 1938, at Pimlico Racetrack in Maryland. Smitham Pollard trained Seabiscuit to start without a gate and everything was going well until Pollard had that near fatal accident aboard pharyngitis that we touched on earlier. With the race weeks away, Smith tried three jockeys on Seabiscuit, but the horse didn't take to any of them.

Finally, George Will, a friend of Pollard, was given the ride and he and Seabiscuit seemed to hit things off. But as the saying goes, when it rains, it pours. And it did exactly that. The day before the match race war admiral liked sloppy tracks and Seabiscuit didn't. For the working class horse, the odds just kept stacking up. So Wolf walked the course the night before, seeking out the driest part of the track. On the day of the race, even President Roosevelt stopped and listened to the radio broadcast.

The Nazis were ramping up forces for World War Two. Just a couple of days earlier, the world had been in a panic over Orson Welles broadcast of War of the Worlds. And on top of everything, people were still struggling to come out of the Great Depression. With all that going on, the race became a sort of symbol and reflection of the times in America.

Poor against rich, elite against average. Seabiscuit gave them something tangible, something to count on, and he took the early lead war.

Admiral rallied, though, and matched him stride for stride. Wolfe eased up on Seabiscuit. Pollard had told him that the horse like to see his rivals and what he was up against, or admiral edged slightly ahead and the two entered the stretch. Seabiscuit caught up nose to nose. They ran and then Seabiscuit poured on the speed. Despite so many disadvantages, he won the race by an impressive four lengths working. America saw in him a hero, a fighter who represented them and could overcome great obstacles.

Howard said that what made Seabiscuit a great racehorse was his heart. He loved to run and put everything he had into his races. The people said he was scrappy and what he lacked in stature. He made up with pure gripped the nation named Ten Top. Newsmakers that year, including Roosevelt and Hitler, the 10th spot went to Seabiscuit, who retired after that match race, at least for a while. Pollard reunited with his beloved horse for one final race, winning the 1940 Santa Anita Handicap at the ripe age of seven.

Seabiscuit retired for good this time and lived out his days comfortably and well cared for at Howard's California ranch. As for Red Pollard, Howard traded his higher jockey like a son paying for his hospital bills after that fall on fairness tests, taking him in when he recovered and even paying for a nurse, a nurse who Pollard eventually married. The two went on to live a happy life together. While the stories of Pollard and Seabiscuit had fairy tale endings, temporary jockey George Wolfe wasn't so lucky.

Wolfe struggled with his weight, constantly trying to keep it down low enough to ride. He resorted to disordered exercise and eating off and running in sweaters before race day and depriving himself of food and water. Complicating his struggle was the fact that he was diabetic. Collecting a paycheck was a balance between staying at the right weight and managing his blood sugar, and it was a balancing act that would one day prove fatal. On a winter day in 1946, Wolf passed out while raising his head, hit the rail and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

For him, the race was over. Behind every winning horse has been people each with their own powerful story. And among the heartache and shadows along the back stretch, there are beacons of light. Although she'd been born, Helen Chinnery, everyone just called her Penni. Her father went from poverty to millionaire status and owned a farm called Meadow Stables in Virginia. Her mother died in 1967 and her father became ill. Unable to manage the farm, racing was still a male dominated sport, but she managed to run Meadows stables.

She convinced trainer Lucien Lorand come out of retirement to train and manage the farm's horses. And when her father died, leaving behind an enormous tax bill, she negotiated the largest indication for a horse ever selling breeding rights to Secretariat for seven million dollars. That's about 70 million. Today, she became one of the first women to be admitted to the elite and male dominated Jockey Club. She served for a few years as president of Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association, and she also founded the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, which rescued retired racehorses from abuse, neglect and slaughter for her contributions.

A year after her death in 2017, she was awarded the highest honor given to thoroughbred owners and breeders by the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. The pillar of the turf. Then there's Ron Turcotte, who, for his wins on several of America's best racehorses in the 1960s and 70s, was given the prestigious George Wolfe Memorial Jockey Award. It's the honor given to jockeys who are shining examples of personal and professional conduct in thoroughbred racing. Turcotte took a fall from a horse at the start of a race in Belmont Park in 1978, and the accident left him a paraplegic.

But he still makes appearances, attracts today helping to raise money for the Permanently Disabled Jockeys Fund. And even this year, there's more history to be made for the first time in the running of the Kentucky Derby. The race did not take place on the first Saturday of May due to covid-19. America's most famous race was held on September 4th. But that's to be expected because of the history of horse racing has taught us anything over the years. It's that the records and traditions from long ago aren't just there to be revered and respected.

Sometimes they're meant to be broken. There's more to this story. Stick around after the brief sponsor break to hear all about it. He needed to lose 10 pounds before the race, so thirty five year old Irish American writer Frank Hayes ran and swept.

He was determined to make it as a first rate jockey, but that dream had eluded him. He spent most of his time exercising the horses instead of riding them across the finish line. Time and time again had watched from the sidelines as the horses he trained entered the winner's circle with a smiling jockey posing for the crowd. And while each of those jockeys was cheered, he was quietly guiding the horses off the track. His big break came when a horse suddenly didn't have a jockey for an upcoming race.

He asked to ride the horse, but the owner declined. Hayes weighed too much, and every pound counts in games of speed after a lot of convincing and promising that he'd lose the weight before race day. He was given the ride. He had just days to drop 10 pounds. It's impossible to do healthily, but he denied himself food and water.

The morning of the race, he jogged some more and the jockey room and excited. Hayes told his fellow riders that today was a great day to make history. He had no idea how right he was. The day was rather warm on June 4th of nineteen twenty three, and when Hayes finally climbed into the saddle, he wasn't just 10 pounds lighter, he was dehydrated and exhausted. Thankfully, he had little pressure to win. He'd never won a race before, and his horse filly named Sweet Kiss was a 20 to one long shot against the favorite, the highly regarded horse Jimmy.

From the start, sweet kiss and gimme were the front runners, and after clearing fence after fence, the two alternated trading first position back and forth like some sort of relay. Then it became a match race. Just these two horses barreling for the finish line at the top of the stretch. The crowd jumped to their feet, cheering on Hayes and Sweet Kiss try as he might give me, couldn't shake off the newcomer and the two were never more than a couple of lengths apart.

Sweet kiss under encouragement from Hayes surged in front and then opened up her lead over Gimme One Hundred Yards before the finish line of the grueling two mile steeplechase, Hayes dropped one hand casually to a side as though he and Sweet Kiss were out for a Sunday stroll. Or maybe he was fixing his stirrup. Seconds after cruising across the finish line as the winner, sweet kiss, cantered 100 yards and then stopped, and that's when Hayes swayed to one side and tumbled to the ground.

Onlookers rushed to see if he was OK and to congratulate him on a stunning victory. But he hadn't collapsed from shock or dehydration. Frank Hayes was dead. Naturally, the usual after race activities were canceled. No jockey weigh in and certainly no posing in the winner's circle. After a brief investigation, the Racing Board determined that Hayes had probably had a heart attack. Just before the finish line, the Jockey Club decided that since no foul play had occurred, Sweet Kisses Win shouldn't be disqualified.

And in doing so, Frank Hayes became the only jockey in history to win a race while dead. In fact, Hayes is still the only dead athlete to win in any competitive sport. A week later, he was buried in the same silk's he wore on the day he died. The race had been his first and last win. Sweet Kiss never raced again after that day and retired unbeaten. And like Hayes, that race had also been her first.

It's not that she didn't want to keep competing, just that no one would ride her. You see, she had picked up a new nickname, one that frightened off all the other jockeys. The sweet kiss. ofDeath. American Chateaux is hosted by Lauren Vogel Bomb. This episode was written by Michelle Muto with researcher Robin Miniter and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young with executive producers Aaron Minkey, Alex Williams and Matt Frederick. To learn more about the show, visit Greyman, Millicom for more podcast from My Heart Radio, visit the I Heart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.