Florida Thoroughbred

Early thoroughbred breeders (mainly the bluegrass hardboots of Kentucky) warned that thoroughbred horses couldn't survive the Florida heat and swampland. "Stick to raising alligators", they mocked. Today the thoroughbred industry is a major business in the state (ranking third in terms of revenue), and race horses that are born, raised and trained in Florida gallop to worldwide acclaim. This account by award-winning turf writer Charlene R. Johnson is a complete history of racing and breeding in the state. Long known as a winter racing mecca, the Hialeah Race Track opened the "palm tree circuit" in 1925 with a dusty track, an infield of burned weeds, and no unloading facilities for the tired horses who arrived by train from New York. The first string to race at Hialeah unloaded in downtown Miami and walked ten miles to the track while grooms wielded baseball bats to protect the horses from snakes. The success - and quirky personality - of Needles, the first Florida thoroughbred to win the Kentucky Derby, coming from second-to-last position on the backstretch in 1956, accelerated the state's breeding programme.
Johnson documents the business from the early era in Tallahassee in the 1800s to its unprecedented growth in Marion County, where limestone deposits in the countryside provide the perfect nutrients for healthy bones and cartilage in livestock. Interviews with first- and second-generation horse people contribute to this record. Among more than a hundred photographs in the book are shots of the famous captive flamingos at Hialeah, Rough 'n' Tumble's swimming pool at Ocala Stud, Carryback, the second Florida thoroughbred to win the Kentucky Derby, and Affirmed, the first to win the Triple Crown. Appendixes provide information on tracks, earnings, winners and breeder awards.