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They Put the Racing Hall Across From the Track. The First Room Was a Casino. · The Red Solo Traveler Podcast

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: So you are standing on the sidewalk of Union Avenue
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: in Saratoga Springs.
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: It's this really wide tree-lined street. If you look to
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: your left, you see the track, the grandstand.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the racecourse.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And it's loud. It's sprawling. But then you turn around,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: look at the opposite side of the street, and there
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: is this very quiet brick Georgian... Building.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: The museum.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the museum. So welcome to the Red Solo Traveler podcast.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Today we're exploring Louis Aziz's latest Red Solo Traveler essay
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: to answer one, I mean, pretty simple question for you,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: the listener.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: A million dollar question, really.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Right. If you only have a passing interest in horse racing, like,
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: you're not a diehard fan, is walking into the National
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame actually worth buying
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: a ticket?
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: It's such a good framing because, you know, you're standing
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: there weighing your options. You're wondering if you're about to
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: pay just to look at, uh, A bunch of dusty
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: saddles that mean absolutely nothing to you. Yeah, exactly.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Because I think about how sports halls of fame usually work.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: They usually pick some completely neutral city, right?
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: Like Canton for football.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, or Cooperstown for baseball. And they just sort of
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: drop this massive shrine there and hope a tourist economy
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: organically grows around it. But Saratoga is totally different.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: It completely inverts that model. I mean, the core thesis
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: here is that the Hall of Fame sits there because
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: the meat already did. Right. They didn't have to, you know,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: invent a hometown. The racing was actively happening right there.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: So they just put the plaques directly across the street
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: from the grandstand.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Which is such a simple but brilliant idea. But to
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: really understand why that track was already there, we kind
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: of have to rewind to the 1860s.
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: And it's not the polite high society history you might expect.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: It's really gritty. It starts with this guy, John Morrissey. Right.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: John Morrissey. He was an Irish prizefighter. A gambler.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: A bare-knuckle brawler, basically.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: He was an opportunist. And he does the one who
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: runs the first thoroughbred card in town.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: On August 3, 1863, right?
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Exactly. August 3, 1863, on the old trotting grounds. And
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: it works so well that he just decides, okay, we
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: need a permanent spot.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: So he literally just moves it across the street. Right.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: The very next summer, August Tech, 1864, he formally opens
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: the Saratoga Racecourse.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Which is the one that's still there today.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: And the first race is the Traverse Stakes, and a
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: cult named Kentucky actually wins it. Yes.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: But, you know, setting up that timeline, 1863, 1864, we
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: have to stop and cut down a very specific claim
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: right here.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: The age claim. Right. Because people always say, oh, 1863,
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: that makes it the oldest track in America. Right.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: And it sounds great on a brochure, but it is
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: explicitly not the oldest U.S. track.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: Wait, is it?
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: No, not at all. Fairgrounds down in New Orleans dates
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: back to 1852. Oh, wow. Freehold in New Jersey goes
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: back to 1854. And Pleasanton out in California is 1858.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: So Saratoga is definitely not the oldest.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: Right. What's fascinating here is what Saratoga actually is. It
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: is the oldest major thoroughbred meeting that still runs on
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: the exact same street as the plaques honoring it.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: That unbroken continuity, that makes sense.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: It does. But there's another myth we have to address
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: with that 1860s timeline.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: The Civil War myth.
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: Exactly. There's this highly romanticized narrative that, you know, the
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: sport just politely paused during the war and the pristine
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: farms in Kentucky saved the thoroughbred.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Which is just, I mean, completely false.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: It is aggressively false. We have to warn you not
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: to buy into that. The reality was brutal. Cavalry units
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: requisitioned horses right off the farms.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they literally ate horse flesh when supply lines broke down.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And the southern racing meetings completely collapsed with the plantations.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: So there was no polite pause. None.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: The sharper fact here is that Morrissey didn't wait for Appomattox.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: He ran a fashionable, lucrative northern meet while the armies
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: were actively in the field.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: That is wild. I mean, Gettysburg happens and a month
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: later he's running a race meet.
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: Right. He weaponized the moment for northern elites.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: But he could only do that, right? Because people were
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: already completely obsessed with the sport.
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely. The cultural groundwork was laid way before Morrissey. Right.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: English colonists brought it over like all the way back
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: in 1665. Yeah.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: Royal Governor Richard Nichols laid out a course on Long Island,
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: called it New Market, just like in England.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: And then it shifted south, right? Like Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas. Yeah.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: Annapolis was a huge center for it.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: And that north-south divide really showed up early. Like Louis
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: mentions that 1823 match race.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: Oh, American Eclipse and Sir Henry? Yeah.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: On Long Island, American Eclipse was the New York horse
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: and Sir Henry was the Southern Colt. And Eclipse won
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: two out of three heats. Right.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: And we connect this to the bigger picture. The newspapers
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: literally sold this event as the North versus the South.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: Using sectional hatred as a sales pitch.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Forty years before the Civil War, they were fighting
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: it out with horses instead of weapons.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: That is crazy. OK, but let's jump back to Saratoga.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: We know the sport is old. We know the track
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: survived the Civil War. But how do we actually get
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: the brick museum across the street?
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: Well, it didn't start in that brick building.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Wait, it didn't?
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: No, not at all. The museum was founded in 1950,
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: but the very first public room opened on August 6, 1951,
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: inside the Canfield Casino. A casino?
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: A gambling house that John Morrissey himself built back in 1870.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: That is so fitting. You're trying to legitimize a sport,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: and your first museum exhibit is in a casino. Right.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: And the very first object they displayed was just a
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: single horseshoe from Lexington, the famous stallion. But, you know,
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: the casino is just a placeholder.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: Right. They needed a permanent spot. Exactly.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: Exactly. So they build the dedicated brick house right on
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: Union Avenue. It gets dedicated on August 16, 1955, and
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: opens to the public on June 6, 1956.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: And the Hall of Fame was basically invented with this move, right? Yes.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: They didn't really have a Hall of Fame before this.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: So that first class in 1955 was entirely a catch-up list.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: Just a huge backlog of history.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they're inducting Lexington, Sir Archie, the great jockey Isaac Murphy.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: Almost nobody on that list was actually alive to hear
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: their name called.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: That kind of reminds me of baseball, right? Like what
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: Cooperstown did?
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: Well, and we'll only say one sentence about Cooperstown. Well,
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: baseball opened its hall on a myth. Abner, Doubleday, never
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: even told. Racing opened its hall on names the sport
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: already firmly agreed upon.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: That's a great point. But yeah, we'll drop that. This
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: isn't the Doubleday episode.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: So fast forward to today. The brick building is there
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: across the street. If you, the listener, walk in and
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: you aren't a racing fanatic, Is the $ 20 ticket worth it?
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: According to Louis' stance, yes. It absolutely works for non-fans.
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: Why is that? Because the Shrine sits exactly where the
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: event still happens every single August.
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: So what does this all mean for the vibe inside?
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: It means you don't need a derby hat. You don't
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: need a mint julep. There's none of that most exciting
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: two minutes in sports aesthetic.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Because that's Churchill Downs.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: Exactly. That belongs to Churchill. Saratoga is different.
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: Okay, so let's walk through the actual building. Louis highlights
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: three specific rooms you have to think. Right.
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: First up is the sculpture gallery. And the biggest thing
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: in that room is the Visa trophy.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: Which I assume most people think is the Triple Crown Cup, right?
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Because it's huge.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Oh, everyone assumes that. But it's not. It's actually from
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: a 1996 to 2000 Travers Point series.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Wait, seriously? It's just a corporate sponsorship trophy. Yeah.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: It's this massive piece of hardware for a point series
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: that Literally nobody under 30 even remembers.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: That is hilarious. Okay, what's the second room?
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: The Triple Crown Gallery. It's the room everyone pretends they
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: didn't come to see, but they absolutely do.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: People don't want to see Secretariat.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Exactly. It holds the 13 Triple Crown winners. But what's
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: fascinating is how the room explicitly highlights the massive 37-year
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: gap between affirmed in 1978 and American Pharoah in 2015.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: You can just physically feel the drought in the room.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: You really can.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: Oh, and Louis mentions a plaque on the wall in
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: there for Hollywood Park.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: Yes, and it deserves a lot of respect. It mattered
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: deeply to the sport, and it ran its final card
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: on December 22, 2013. It's a reminder that not every
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: track survives.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: That's pretty sobering. But then you leave that area, and
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: you hit the third room, which is completely different, the
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: 2020 Digital Hall. Right.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: They replaced the traditional bronze plaques with a digital interactive experience.
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: But to make that work, you have to sit and
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: watch a 16-minute immersive film called What It Takes.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: And it's narrated by Bob Costas, naturally. Of course.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: But the film is crucial. It gives the emotional anchor
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: to the digital plaques so they don't just feel like
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: a dry directory of names.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: That makes a lot of sense. So say you're planning
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: this trip. You hear all this and think, great, I'll
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: go to Saratoga, hit the racing museum, and then maybe
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: drive over to the auto museum or Cooperstown.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: Oh, let me stop you right there. Louie has a
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: strict pairing rule. Do not try to invent a Saratoga
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: hub itinerary on the fly.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: So no mixing the spa cars and the horses? No.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: The Saratoga Auto Museum is a completely different ticket, and
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: it demands a completely different day.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: In Cooperstown.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: Cooperstown is an entirely different drive. Do not try to
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: pair them.
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: Got it. Keep it focused.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: So looking at everything we've talked about today, bringing it
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: back to the title and the core of the essay.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: The reality of this visit is just so uniquely honest.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: They opened the track while the country was actively at war.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: They opened the museum in a literal casino. And then
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: they put the national plaques right across the street.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: That is the entire essence of the visit. This is
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: why it works. It really is.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: And, you know, I want to leave you, the listener,
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: with a final thought to mull over. When you visit
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: any historical monument or Hall of Fame, consider how rare
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: it is for a museum to be totally subordinate to
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: the living street outside its doors. Ask yourself, is this
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: building honoring a ghost town of memories? Or is the
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: history it celebrates still breathing, running, and echoing right across
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: the street?
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: That is such a great perspective to take on your
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: next trip. Well, thank you for traveling with us today
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: on this edition of the Red Solo Traveler podcast. We
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: will see you next time.