Horse Racing in Kentucky, Part II Horse racing plants its feet in Louisville, setting the stage for the birth of Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby. The Move to Louisville With the Oakland Race Course opening in southwest Louisville in 1832, the city's racing flew out of the starting gate. The land on which the track was purchased, symbolically enough, came from Samuel Churchill. By that time of course Louisville had a Jockey Club of its own--Churchill himself was even president of the Louisville Association for the Improvement of the Breed of Horses. But the Oakland track was too far out in the country to attract spectators from Louisville and the track died a slow death, done in by its location and the financial Panic of 1857. It was replaced, however, by the Woodlawn Race Course, but not for long. Although races were held at Woodlawn all during the Civil War, the lack of restaurants and hotels nearby didn't left Woodlawn unable to compete when racing spread to other cities nationwide after the war. (Woodlawn has still left an imprint on the modern day Triple Crown, however. After it closed one of its challenge trophies ws passed on to the Louisville Jockey Club. Today the Woodlawn vase is the perpetual trophy of the Preakness Stakes, the winners of the race actually receiving a half-size replica.) In 1859, Albert Fink, the chief engineer of the L&N Railroad, supervised construction of the L&N road to Nashville. He then worked on a line running south through Bowling Green. When these lines were completed, the L&N had a firm control of commerce throughout Kentucky and into the South as well. Not coincidentally, by the end of the Civil War Nashville and Kentucky had become important thoroughbred breeding centers in the United States. But the monopoly irked businessmen in Cincinnati and Lexington, and in 1869 Bluegrass farmers and merchants began lobbying the legislature on behalf of a Cincinnati railway that would run through Lexington and then into Tennessee as well. By then Louisville businesses had severed their northern ties since the only market for Louisville-made tools and food staples was in the war-ravaged South, making "former Confederate officers and soldiers precious commodities when the city's Board of Trade began promoting Louisville as the 'Gateway to the South.'" But the competition grew between Louisville and Cincinnati when the L&N Railroad refused to decrease their rates and even referred to Cincinnati merchants as an "ingenious set of Yankee plodders and plotters." The railroad wars came to a boil: Cincinnati leaders petitioned the Tennessee Legislature for permission to build a track to Chattanooga, but were denied their request and were appalled when the L&N was granted permission to build a Louisville-Chattanooga line itself. Almost overnight, the railroad issue became an all-out trade war, pitting Louisville against the rest of the Bluegrass. Kentucky legislators twice voted down Cincinnati's request for a right-of-way line through central Kentucky. Afterwards, Bluegrass businessmen and farmers boycotted Louisville goods and the L&N service. By April of 1870, Louisville salesmen were not welcome anywhere near Lexington or its neighboring towns, which eventually also led to a signigicant decrease in the amount of thoroughbreds at the Woodlawn Race Course. Things got worse for Louisville. The Cincinnati Southern Railway introduced a third bill in January 1872, this time winning with the help of former United States Vice-President John C. Breckinridge. In spite of a major economic depression, construction began on a Cincinnati-Chattanooga line in 1873; by 1880 the line was complete and goods from the Bluegrass were bypassing the city, ending Louisville's monopoly as a transportation crossroads. With the eventual closure of the Woodlawn Race Course, and compounded by business difficulties due to the new train line between Cincinnati and Chattanooga, Louisville lost its hold on statewide and Southern trade. Louisville civic leaders, among them the Churchill brothers, decided on a new track for the much needed shot in the arm. The Louisville Jockey Club and Driving Park Association, eventually called Churchill Downs, opened three years later. Surprisingly, the train lines that inspired the new track also helped it prosper: soon after George Pullman built the first passenger sleeping car, horse cars were developed. It was no coincidence that the Louisville Jockey Club was within walking distance of the L & N railroad tracks and that "L & N horsecar service to Bluegrass horse farms became the best in the business." Still, the Cincinnati Southern Railway gave rise to the Latonia Track in Covington, located in the Latonia neighborhood of Covington where the Latonia Shopping Plaza is today. (A state historical placard is located at the corner of Winston and 38th St. at the American Legion Hall, about a quarter mile from the original entrance to the track which was located at the end of Latonia Avenue.) The current track location near the Cincinnati airport was developed in the 1960's. For more than 20 years the Latonia course outdrew crowds and ran better horses than what became Churchill Downs, even after the Kentucky Derby was born. By the end of World War I, however, Churchill Downs grew and expanded due in large part from the clout and support of the L&N Railroad. In 1918 Churchill Downs expanded, calling itself the Kentucky Jockey Club, Inc.. It bought the Latonia course, which through 1922 attracted the highest purses in the state and consequently the best horses. It was then that a New York businessman named August Belmont asked the club to share in the wealth of New York racing; the size of Latonia's purses threatened the existence of New York racing because horsemen in New York would naturally flee to where the larger purses were. The Kentucky Derby was dependent on New York horses and couldn't afford to drive New York racing out of business. Churchill Downs leader Matt Winn discontinued Latonia's $10,000 to $50,000 purses; its popularity was held in check and its stature slowly faded. By 1929 the Kentucky Jockey Club had turned into the American Track Association and was purchasing out of state tracks. The Great Depression caused the sale of these tracks however, and almost wiped out many Bluegrass horsemen. After reorganing during the immediate years after the Depression, Lexington businessmen established the Keeneland Race track. While it does have a rich history and a proud legacy of "what horse racing is meant to be," it is not the home of the Kentucky Derby, and thereby not of extreme significance to Call To The Derby Post. But two things must be pointed out before leaving Keeneland: first, among other races Keeneland hosts the Blue Grass Stakes, a major prep race for the Derby, and second, the track still ranks as a premier home for Kentucky racing. As late as 1986 every Kentucky-bred person on Keeneland's Board of Directors could saddle and bridle a horse. The Keeneland Library contains the most complete collection of thoroughbred history and statistics available to the public. Finally, the non-dividend-paying Keeneland Association is one of the largest single coporate donors to community programs, health services and educational institutions in the state. Unlike the rivalry between Lexington and Louisville in college basketball, both Keeneland and Churchill Downs, as well as other Bluegrass tracks like Turfway Park, all mutually contribute to making Kentucky the horse racing capital of the world. Cocktails with the Sport of Kings | The Arrival of Thoroughbreds | Into the Colonies and America Foundations: Bluegrass and Lexington | The Move to Louisville Churchill's Colonel | Derby Growing Pains | The Legacy of Matt Winn | The Home Stretch: Into Modern Times