Turf writers Dick Jerardi, Paul Moran, and John L. Hervey have been selected to the National Museum of Racing's Joe Hirsch Media Roll of
Honor, the museum announced via press release Tuesday.
Jerardi grew up in Baltimore and graduated from the University of Maryland with a journalism degree and a minor in history. He attended his first GI Preakness S. in 1973 and became immersed in the game by frequenting the betting windows at Pimlico, Bowie, Laurel, and Timonium almost daily from 1977 to early 1985.
He began authoring freelance articles about horse racing for the Baltimore News American and was the racing writer for Sports First, a Baltimore paper dedicated exclusively to sports that lasted just a year beginning in 1983.
In February 1985, Jerardi was hired as the horse racing writer for the Philadelphia Daily News and became a fixture on the national scene. He covered every Triple Crown race from 1987 through 2017 and nearly every Breeders' Cup during the same period while writing more than 7,000 stories for the paper during 33 years there, mostly about horse racing.
Jerardi's favorite experiences in racing were from 2004 through 2006, when three horses with Philadelphia connections—Smarty Jones, Afleet Alex, and Barbaro—won five of seven Triple Crown races.
In 2006, Jerardi won the Eclipse Award for his series on Barbaro. He has won the Red Smith Award for GI Kentucky Derby coverage five times and is a three-time winner of the Joe Hirsch Award for best Breeders' Cup story. In 2007, Jerardi was chosen by the National Turf Writers and Broadcasters as the winner of the Walter Haight Award for career excellence in turf writing.
Jerardi is co-host of Let's Go Racing, a 30-minute weekly horse racing television show that has been on the air in the Philadelphia market for more than 30 years.
He also wrote a weekly column for Daily Racing Form for 20 years and was a charter member of the Beyer Speed Figure team that was first assembled in the mid-1980s and continues to this day with the Beyers appearing in the Form for the past three decades.
Moran (1947 ̶ 2013) was born in Buffalo, N.Y., and graduated from the University at Buffalo. He served in Vietnam and the Middle East as a sergeant in the Air Force before beginning a distinguished career in sports journalism, primarily known for his prowess as a racing writer.
Moran covered his first Triple Crown races in 1973 during Secretariat's
historic run and continued to cover the series without interruption for the next 35 years. He wrote for the Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel from 1975 to 1985 then joined the staff at Newsday on Long Island, N.Y., where he worked until 2008.
Moran won two Eclipse Awards while at Newsday. He also won the Red Smith Award for his Kentucky Derby coverage, as well as the Associated Press Sports Editors Award from the American Society of Newspaper Editors in 1990 and the Distinguished Sports Writing Award from the New York Newspaper Publishers Association in 1992.
Moran semi-retired to Saratoga Springs, N.Y., in 2008, but continued to write for various outlets, including ESPN.com. He also worked six Saratoga meetings for The Associated Press.
After a three-year battle with cancer, Moran died in November 2013. The following summer, a group of Moran's friends and colleagues scattered his ashes in the Saratoga Race Course infield near the grave of Go for Wand, as per Moran's wishes.
Hervey (1870 ̶ 1947), a native of Jefferson, Ohio, was described by The Thoroughbred of California as “the dean of American turf journalists.” He began writing about Thoroughbred and Standardbred racing around the age of 16. Raised in a horse-centric family, Hervey developed a considerable knowledge of the art and science of horse breeding.
While still a teenager, Hervey put that knowledge to good use when he was hired by William Fasig to work in his sales organization, the Tipton Company of Cleveland (later becoming the Fasig-Tipton Company), and soon he was writing articles for a variety of turf journals.
Hervey became editor of The Trotting Horse in 1892. He also provided racing coverage for the Chicago Tribune in the 1890s and became one of Daily Racing Form's first contributors, remaining an occasional correspondent for the Form until his death.
In 1912, Hervey became editor for The Thoroughbred Record. It was during this period that Hervey, who used the pen name “Salvator” in honor of the Hall of Fame racehorse, became widely regarded as one of America's foremost authorities on all aspects of racing and breeding. The Jockey Club hired Hervey to research and document American racing's history in a multi-edition work, Racing in America.
Hervey was so well thought of in harness racing that he was posthumously inducted into the Harness Racing Hall of Fame in 1962. The John Hervey Awards for excellence in harness racing journalism are named in his honor.
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