Aristides, Part 2: Kentucky Derby Day 1875

Apr 28, 2024 Kellie Reilly/Brisnet.com

H.P. McGrath, owner/breeder of Aristides (Photo courtesy of the Kentucky Derby Museum/Churchill Downs)

Continued from Aristides, Part 1

And so the stage was set for that first Kentucky Derby, on Monday, May 17, 1875, the grand opening of the Louisville Jockey Club and Driving Park Association, later called Churchill Downs.

Spearheading the development of both track and Derby was Meriwether Lewis Clark Jr. A grandson of the famed William Clark of the Lewis and Clark expedition, and the great-nephew of Louisville founder George Rogers Clark, he deliberately sought to follow the precedent set by the English classics. Like the illustrious Epsom Derby, the Kentucky Derby was originally contested at 1 1/2 miles, and was only shortened to its present 1 1/4-mile distance in 1896.

The new race, and its host track, generated a great deal of enthusiasm. The Louisville Courier-Journal foresaw its long-term consequences:

'Today will be historic to Kentucky annals, as the first 'Derby Day,' of what promises to be a long series of annual turf festivities which we confidently expect our grandchildren 100 years hence, to celebrate in glorious continuous rejoicings, because the president (Clark) hopes to make this a duplicate for the great English turf event.'

The Kentucky Live Stock Record could not quite decide whether it exceeded the level of excitement surrounding the match between Wagner and Grey Eagle in 1839:

'Never before in the history of the Kentucky turf, save the meeting in which the champions Wagner and Grey Eagle met in 1839…has there been so much interest displayed in racing. The Spring Inaugural meeting at Louisville will be far more interesting than even the great races of Wagner and Grey Eagle' because there will be more races carded, 'on each of which hinge the fame and renown of a number of high mettled and high bred candidates for equine honors.'

The journal envisioned the Derby as a contest that would 'make this the racing center of America,' while serving as 'the grand trysting ground over which these great breeding States (Kentucky and Tennessee) will decide the supremacy of their youngsters.'

The Kentucky Live Stock Record also thought strategically in terms of the economic impact upon Louisville:

'Louisville is the metropolis of the State, and a vast crowd of strangers will be in attendance at the race, who will leave large sums of money amongst her hotels and merchants.'

Moreover, these hordes of visitors 'will find a track in all its appurtenances and surroundings the equal, if not the superior, of any in America….From the report of those who have trained on the course, one and all agree that it is one of the safest, fastest, best drained and most admirable tracks in America.'

Nor was this interest a strictly regional phenomenon, for the Spirit of the Times, viewing the scene from its perch in New York, was likewise captivated by the novel idea of the Kentucky Derby, 'which has created deep interest throughout the country.'

In addition to its national cachet, the first Derby also embraced other elements that would become part of its core identity. While 19th-century celebrities, in the form of high society ladies and dapper gentlemen, graced the exclusive portions of the track, ordinary people from every station of life thronged to see the big race, many of them taking advantage of the free admission to the infield.

One of those inhabiting the infield was the 13-year-old Matt Winn, the future impresario of Churchill Downs who would mold the Derby into the all-encompassing experience that it is today. Young Matt viewed the race from aboard his father's grocery wagon, and decades later in his memoir Down the Stretch, he recalled that Chesapeake was all the rage:

'They said he was a great one; one of the greatest that ever was. Little chance for any other horse. Yes, this Chesapeake would stay back until the leading pacemakers reached the turn for home, and then he would charge up at them and just run away from them. So, before the race started, I had come to believe that Chesapeake was the greatest race horse in all the world; that nothing alive could run as fast.'

To set the stage for Chesapeake's closing kick, McGrath knew that a fast early pace would be essential. Accordingly, he entered Aristides to serve as his designated pacemaker, a 'rabbit,' who would do his job before retiring from the scene.

Once again, his experience calls to mind the Athenian Aristides. Just as the little red horse was to be sacrificed for the good of Chesapeake, so was Aristides the Just sacrificed politically, to the benefit of his rival Themistocles. Aristides the Just was banished from Athens, according to the voting procedure known as ostracism, not because he did anything wrong, but because of the intrigues of Themistocles' partisans.

The statesman's banishment was cut short when Athens faced a military crisis, and Aristides returned to play a vital role in the next round of the Persian Wars. In a similar manner, the equine Aristides would also be called upon unexpectedly to rescue his owner's Derby hopes.

With all of the buzz surrounding Chesapeake, the McGrath entry was heavily favored in the wagering. McGrath turned to Ansel, a devout Christian, and asked him to enlist divine aid, according to an account published in Lynn Renau's Racing Around Kentucky.

'You must pray to the Lord to let us win with these poor horses,' McGrath said.

'I don't know much about winning, Mr. McGrath,' Ansel responded, 'but it wouldn't do you any harm to have the Lord with you anywhere.'

Fifteen three-year-olds went to the post, long before the advent of the starting gate, by lining up across the track at the half-mile pole. True to form, Chesapeake was causing trouble at first, but the starter, Col. W.H. Johnson of the Nashville Blood Horse Association, sent the field on its way in good order.

The Kentucky Live Stock Record provided color commentary:

'When they were marshaled into line, he tapped the drum to one of the most capital starts I have ever seen, the 15 going away like a platoon of cavalry, except the (unnamed) Baywood colt, who hung at the post.'

Volcano flashed speed, but McCreery soon sprinted to the fore. The pace was swift by the standards of the time, a quarter-mile in :25 1/2 and a half-mile in :50. According to the McGrath game plan, Aristides was near the front, hounding McCreery every step of the way. Swinging into the backstretch, Aristides took command from the retreating McCreery and kept up the relentless march. The field began to spread out. Many were struggling to keep up, but in the case of Volcano, he was just biding his time before launching his bid.

'The others seemed to be outpaced,' the Courier-Journal recapped, 'for Aristides was cutting out the running at an awful speed, getting back to the finish of the mile in the neighborhood of 1:43.'

With such a superb execution of tactics on the part of his rabbit, surely Chesapeake would begin to uncork his patented late run – or would he? As Aristides rounded the far turn, his African-American rider, Oliver Lewis, was beginning to throttle down on him, as he had been instructed to do. Lewis was hesitant, however, for he could not find Chesapeake, who was supposed to be flying into contention right about now. Ten thousand intent spectators were wondering the same thing.

'Where, oh where, was Chesapeake?' lamented the Courier-Journal. 'Away back in the ruck and not able to do anything for his stable.'

Winn knew exactly where Chesapeake was. He had his eyes trained on the colt from the start, 'not paying much attention to others in the race' because he 'didn't want to miss seeing Chesapeake when he moved into action….Chesapeake, instead of charging, fell back – and back. The crowd was roaring, but not for Chesapeake.'

McGrath was standing at the top of the stretch, and he realized immediately that Chesapeake was a forlorn hope. Lewis, of course, could not be certain of that from his position aboard Aristides up front. Moreover, with McGrath being a celebrated gambler, Lewis had to make sure that if he kept riding, he wouldn't ruin a carefully laid betting coup.

Lewis glanced at McGrath for a signal, and the owner enthusiastically waved him on, hat in hand, telling him to 'go on with the good little red horse and win if he could all alone.'

And so, responding to the crisis in the middle of the race, Aristides was suddenly recalled from his banishment as a rabbit. Upon him, and him alone, would the fortunes of the McGrath entry rest. But Lewis would not have driven Aristides so hard early, if he had any pretensions of winning. Now, in the most exacting of circumstances, the colt soldiered on as he braced for the inevitable challengers.

'The crowd was still roaring,' Winn reminisced. 'I saw a horse out in front – a horse carrying a jockey whose colors were green, with an orange band. Chesapeake's colors!'

For a split second, young Matt Winn thought that maybe Chesapeake was winning after all. But then, just as quickly, he noticed that the colt in the lead was a 'bright chestnut,' not a deeply colored bay like Chesapeake.

'Who was the little fellow up in front, shaking off one challenge after another, racing gamely and true to the finish line? Who was this little chestnut whirlwind?' Winn wondered, only to learn from his father that it was Chesapeake's stablemate, Aristides.

'Right gallantly did the game and speedy son of Leamington and Sarong answer the call on his forces,' the Courier-Journal reported, 'for he held his own all down the stretch, in spite of a most determined rush on the part of Volcano and Verdigris, and dashed under the wire the winner of one of the fastest and hardest races ever seen on a track. Aristides forced the pace all the way for his stable companion Chesapeake, and so had no respite at all, which makes his performance a very remarkable one.'

As if the manner of his victory were not commendable enough, the little red colt also set a new record for the distance. His final time of 2:37 3/4 ranked as the fastest 1 1/2 miles ever run by a three-year-old at that time.

The Kentucky Live Stock Record believed that he had scored rather comfortably:

'The race from this point home was never in doubt, Aristides winning by two lengths with something in hand.'

In the process, he scored the first leg of an historic double for his sire. In 1881, Leamington's son Iroquois captured the Epsom Derby. Leamington thus became the charter member of an exclusive club of stallions who have sired winners of both the Kentucky and Epsom Derbies. In the 20th century, he would be joined by such eminences as *Blenheim II, Hyperion, Hail to Reason, and Nijinsky II.

Aristides also established one of the recurring motifs of Kentucky Derby history. It would not be the last time that the supposed lesser half of the entry, the inferior representative of the stable, stole the limelight.

Ten Broeck trudged home fifth, the archetype of the massively talented horse who was just not mature enough on Derby Day. He would only reach the peak of his powers as an older campaigner. Chesapeake wound up eighth, the first in a series of two-year-old champions who failed in the Derby.

The Spirit of the Times rhapsodized about Aristides:

'His machinery is most perfectly balanced….His action is smooth, graceful, and springy; his shoulders good, heart and lungs unusually well developed; limbs most perfectly formed, clean, and hard as ivory; feet excellent; hips, thighs and gascons prominent and strong, loin perfect, and in short, the whole tout ensemble denotes a lithe, wiry, stout, never-tiring, never-to-be-worn-out racehorse.'

Part 3: Life and legacy after the inaugural Kentucky Derby

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