FAIR GROUNDS RACE COURSE
By: Tom Ferry
There is no city in America like New Orleans and there is no racetrack like the Fair Grounds. Located two miles from the French Quarter in the heart of the Crescent City, these beloved grounds have been a staple of southern Thoroughbred racing since 1872. Much like the spirit and resilience of the city and its people, the story of the Fair Grounds has been one of survival. Across 150 years, the track has overcome the Civil War, two fires, bankruptcy, and Hurricane Katrina, and yet today… it prospers.
Technically speaking, the Fair Grounds is the second oldest horse racing track still in existence in America after New Jersey’s Freehold Raceway which opened its gates in the 1830s. Horse racing has taken place on this New Orleans real estate since 1852 when the facility was known as the Union Race Course. It closed five years later and re-opened in 1859 as the Creole Race Course. The name was changed to the Fair Grounds in 1863 and the first official race card and call to post occurred on April 13, 1872.
The track has seen its share of historic and colorful characters over the years. During that first meet in 1872, General George Armstrong Custer was an owner with horses stabled on the grounds, four years before he and his men were killed at the Little Bighorn. Four years after the conclusion of his presidency, Ulysses S. Grant attended the track’s 1880 spring meet. There were big personalities on the racecourse as well. Winnie O’Connor, one of the sport’s first great jockeys, spent a good portion of his career at the Fair Grounds and was once suspended for discharging a pistol in the jock’s quarters.
Many great horses have run at the track across a storied history, however, three of them captured hearts of Fair Grounds racing fans unlike any other and have been remembered to this day. There has never been a mare like Pan Zareta. From 1912 through 1917, she ran 151 times on 24 different tracks across America, winning 76 times. In fact, she finished in the money in 85 percent of her starts regardless of the high weights she often carried. She once carried 146 pounds in a victory, conceding 46 pounds to the runner-up. Pan Zareta was in training during her 8-year-old season when she died suddenly of pneumonia in her stall at the Fair Grounds. She was buried in the track’s infield.
Six years after Pan Zareta’s passing, a young black colt put the Fair Grounds on the map once again when he won the 50th running of the Kentucky Derby. His name was Black Gold. In one of the most thrilling renditions of the Run for the Roses, Black Gold was bumped during the race’s final 70 yards and driven five wide but recovered to win at the wire. At age seven, tragedy struck during the Salome Purse at the Fair Grounds when the colt broke down in the stretch, finishing the race on three legs. He was euthanized at the track and heartbreak once again fell across New Orleans and the Fair Grounds. Black Gold was buried on the track’s infield near the sixteenth pole and close to his fellow Hall of Famer Pan Zareta. Each year, the Black Gold Stakes and the Pan Zareta Handicap are run at the race course and the winning jockeys place a wreath on the respective graves of the two legends.
From 1977-1990, the Fair Grounds was owned by Thoroughbred owner and trainer Louie J. Roussel III. In 1988, a three-year-old colt owned by Roussel and popular New Orleans car dealer Ronnie Lamarque captured the Fair Grounds’ signature race, the Louisiana Derby. After a disappointing third place finish in the Kentucky Derby, Risen Star went on to capture the Preakness Stakes and then won the Belmont Stakes by a dominating 141/2 lengths. An injury that occurred in the Belmont resulted in his immediate retirement but he was awarded Champion 3-Year-Old Male honors at the close of the year. The Fair Grounds was home to five of Risen Star’s eleven career starts and he is remembered each year with the Risen Star Stakes for three-year-olds.
When visitors arrive at the Fair Grounds today, they encounter twin gatehouses built in 1862 that still stand at the track’s front entrance on Gentilly Boulevard. These remnants of yesteryear have survived the erosion of time which other track landmarks have not. At least six different grandstands have been erected over the years. A fire at the track three days after Christmas in 1918 destroyed the grandstand and another fire in 1993 destroyed both grandstand and clubhouse. Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005 and the property was inundated with water and a section of the grandstand roof was torn off by the storm’s powerful winds. Once again, the Fair Grounds persevered and after closing the track for a year, it was reopened in late 2006. The facility today is a celebration of glass. The grandstand structure is two stories tall, comprised mostly of windows and subsequently, each racing patron can see every point of the racecourse from their seat.
Food at the Fair Grounds? Hey, you’re in New Orleans and the menus provide the cultural experience you would expect and include jambalaya, seafood gumbo, oysters, po’ boys, and so many other creole delights. The Fair Grounds is also home to one of the world’s largest and most popular concert events, Jazz Fest. This annual celebration of the music and culture of New Orleans and Louisiana is held on seven days in late April and early May. Spread across 12 different stages, the event drew a record 650,000 attendees in 2001.
In the world of horse racing, there are few places as distinctively special as the Fair Grounds on Thanksgiving Day. While the annual racing meet begins in mid-November and runs through late March of the following year, for so many years the race course’s opening day was on the holiday. These days, Thanksgiving at the track has the feel of Mardi Gras in November. It is an equine costume party complete with Bloody Marys in a carnival-like atmosphere. Most importantly, the patrons that day skew heavily young and turn out in droves. They come to celebrate life and New Orleans and provide great optimism that this beloved track may be around for a third incredible century.