Tag: Black jockeys

Catching Up with PPAATH

Last summer, the TDN was first introduced to the Project to Preserve African American Turf History (PPAATH), a Louisville-based group that promotes the education of African American contributions to racing throughout history. In 'The First Steps Towards Inclusiveness in Racing,' we spoke with CEO and Founder Leon Nichols on the inception of their organization and how they hope to change the sport of racing for the better.

A few months after our meeting, the group was featured on NBC's coverage of the 146th Running of the Kentucky Derby in a lead-up story on Necker Island (Hard Spun), the first African American-owned Derby horse in the last 13 years.

Since we last met, PPAATH has created several key partnerships that have allowed them to broaden their outreach.

“Since July, it's been a fabulous growth period for us,” said Nichols. “It takes a community, but this history deserves no less and I think it's all about driving a narrative of diversity and inclusion. To see the evolvement of all this and see the commitment from business leaders and the educational community has been beyond our wildest dream.”

We sat down with PPAATH and their partnership leaders as they shared what they've been up to recently.

The Black Jockey Lounge

Tawana Bain, the CEO of New Age Communications, did not grow up in Louisville, but the award-winning businesswoman said she will never forget her first Kentucky Derby experience.

“When I first moved to Louisville, I had never seen anything so segregated as Derby week,” she said.

“Depending on what social circle you traveled in, if you were a Black professional you were literally zig-zagging across 9th Street because the parties were so separate,” she continued, citing what is known as 'The 9th Street Divide' in Louisville, an invisible racial line that separates the east and west side of the city.

She decided to work to change that four years ago when she created the Derby Diversity Business Summit (DDBS), an event that precedes the Kentucky Derby and helps promote the utilization of diverse business leaders while educating participants on the Kentucky Derby and the sport of horse racing.

“The Summit's various events are designed to draw a community that has been left out of the Derby and attract them back to the Thoroughbred industry in general,” she said.

Last year, Bain connected with PPAATH to help with a virtual DDBS experience on the history of Black jockeys. The event was held on the rooftop of Encore on 4th, a restaurant Bain has owned since 2018.

Tawana Bain hopes her transformed restaurant will create a much-needed niche in Louisville. | photo courtesy Tawana Bain

The evening was such a success that they were inspired to give the concept a more permanent structure by transforming Encore into a restaurant and entertainment venue geared towards celebrating the history of Black jockeys.

They re-named the restaurant 'The Black Jockey Lounge.'

“Prior to COVID, our venue was a destination venue,” Bain said. “It was an experience–the music, the food, the people you knew you would expect to see. We are no longer the only venue that caters to Black professionals who want to do something at night, which is a good thing, but we needed something to set us apart. This concept is unique. It's historic.”

The Black Jockey Lounge, located on 630 S. Fourth Street in Louisville, officially opened this past weekend with live music from the KMF Band. PPAATH brings history to the re-designed space with artwork they have collected of some of the winningest jockeys in history. The menu has also been updated with racing-inspired items.

Calvin Davis, PPAATH's President and Co-Founder, said that the restaurant's location makes it all the more unique.

“This is a historical community being just across from The Palace Theatre and down the street from The Brown Hotel,” he said. “When Jimmy Winkfield [the last African American jockey to ride a Kentucky Derby winner in 1902] went to attend a luncheon held in his honor in 1961 at the Brown Hotel, he was not allowed into his own luncheon. A bellhop didn't recognize Mr. Winkfield and they didn't allow him in to receive his award.”

Even 60 years later, Bain said their location is still an important site for the civil rights movement in the city.

“During the civil unrest last year while we were boarded up, we were one of the stopping places for a lot of protesters of every race and age,” she said. “There's a history there with what we've experienced and who we cater to, and now it's a historical place for tourists who want to know the history and have great food. We really created a niche that I think this city needs and I think we've got something that can revitalize downtown.”

“We think it's going to be something really unique,” Davis added. “It will be a fun place for all people to come get some really good, upscale food, but at the same time, leave with a nugget of history because these stories will just blow you away when you hear the accomplishments of these jockeys.”

Peerless Craft Bourbon Commemorative Bottle

James Natsis serves as PPAATH'S Vice President of Global Affairs and is also a writer for various publications around Louisville.

In 2019, Natsis wrote a feature on the re-opening of Kentucky Peerless Distilling Company, a Louisville-based bourbon distillery that was revived that year after a 102-year hiatus.

Recently, Natsis had the idea for PPAATH to join forces with the distillery.

“They're a family-run business established in the 1880s, so I thought they would be perfect for us,” he said. “When I wrote them, I heard from their marketing person immediately. He was excited to meet with us and now we are making arrangements to launch the first-ever commemorative bottle of bourbon that pays tribute to Black jockeys.”

“They're going to pay a percentage of the sales back to our organization and that will go to help PPAATH create those products and services that will help draw the dollar back to our community,” Davis said.

The new bourbon edition is set to launch in mid-April in the weeks leading up to the Kentucky Derby.

Race to Greatness

The first Race to Greatness event was held at the Kentucky Derby Museum at Churchill Downs. | photo courtesy Von Purdy

Von Purdy is the Director of Community Engagement and Development Officer at Simmons College of Kentucky, the only historically Black college in Louisville.

Purdy had no prior connection to the racing industry when she noticed pictures of Black jockeys at Shirley May's Café, a historical soul food restaurant in Louisville's Smoketown district. She was shocked to learn the jockeys' stories.

“I had no idea,” she said. “I don't think this town does a good job of highlighting the history of the Black jockeys, especially to people who aren't from here. I thought to myself, 'Why is Simmons not involved with this history since we're a place of education?'”

Purdy was inspired to create 'Race to Greatness: A Celebration of the Black Jockeys of the Kentucky Derby.' The event is held annually as a brunch following Thunder Over Louisville, the annual kickoff to the Kentucky Derby Festival.

To provide historical context for the event, Purdy enlisted the help of the PPAATH team to provide artwork and educational pieces for participants to learn from.

The first Race to Greatness celebration was held in 2018, brought in 150 people and raised $45,000. The following year, it raised $145,000.

While the event was cancelled last year due to COVID, Purdy said they have plans to bring it back this April. The first two functions were held at the Kentucky Derby Museum, but this year it will take place at Millionaire's Row at Churchill Downs. The venue can hold up to 800 people, but Purdy plans to limit the guest list to 300 to engage in proper social distancing.

“We want to educate our students and the public and are using this event to do so,” she said. “We want to move the message to help highlight these jockeys.”

Moving Forward

PPAATH has several other projects on the horizon in the coming months.

The Kentucky Derby Museum recently launched a newly expanded exhibit that showcases the impact African Americans have had on racing throughout history.

PPAATH is working with the museum to provide colored prints for visitors to purchase and take home.

“The museum has a visual history from their archives, but we're trying to develop a partnership where we can get artwork available for sale in the retail store so people can take these prints home,” said PPAATH's Vice President and Co-Founder Jerry Fife. “I think a combination of what we've been doing has made them realize the value of pulling this information out, literally out of the basement, and getting it in front of people.”

In addition, PPAATH has partnered with Brown-Forman Corporation, one of the largest American-owned wine and spirits companies that manufactures, among others, Jack Daniel's and Woodford Reserve, to create a Black History Month Fireside Chat event for internal educational use within Brown-Forman's organization.

Nichols said that this first collaboration has already created additional projects with Brown-Forman still in the early stages of development.

Nichols said that he and his team are grateful for the media attention their group has received in the past few months that has allowed them to broaden their outreach to a wider audience.

“The opportunities are endless and with the launch of the first bricks-and-mortar dedication with The Black Jockey Lounge, it's really gotten national attention with media waiting until it all comes together,” he said. “It's really not just a community or a state-wide initiation. The media has given some national legs to it.”

Nichols said that now, more than ever, their mission is essential for the betterment of the racing community.

“I always tell people it's eerily similar as far as the pulse of the nation in 2021 and what was the pulse of the nation in 1896,” he said. “The parallels are strikingly similar. As we know, coming out of the Jim Crow era on into the 20th century, it wasn't just the expulsion of talent, it was the expulsion of a consumer base that had been with horse racing for the last 200 years. Over time, the impact of that on the industry is still being felt today. Now we're in a space where the Kentucky Derby and horse racing in general can take the lead in being an ambassador to drive social change around this nation.”

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Kentucky Derby Museum Launches New African Americans In Thoroughbred Racing Tour

The Kentucky Derby Museum is thrilled to amplify in a new way the stories of Black horsemen, who not only dominated the sport of Thoroughbred racing in the early days of the Kentucky Derby but continue to make a lasting mark on its legacy. Oliver Lewis. Isaac Murphy. Ansel Williamson. These are just a handful of legendary names that guests will learn about during two new immersive opportunities at Kentucky Derby Museum.

On the new African Americans in Racing Tour, made possible with support from Churchill Downs and the James Graham Brown Foundation, guests will walk through Churchill Downs Racetrack while making historically significant stops along the way on this 90 minute experience. Through history, including the Jim Crow era that led to the exclusion of Black jockeys from the sport, and to modern times, guests will learn about the profound impact African Americans have made on horse racing from the very beginning. Visitors will hear incredible stories of how 13 of the 15 horses in the first-ever Kentucky Derby were ridden by Black jockeys, and 15 of the first 28 Derby winners were ridden by Black jockeys. This tour is now available Saturdays at 1 p.m. and is $15 per person.

Secondly, the Museum is launching the “Proud of My Calling” experience, a monthly, 60-minute immersive program where visitors are introduced to incredible Black horsemen through costumed actors, historic paintings, photos and objects from the past. Meet greats like Oliver Lewis, Isaac Murphy and Ansel Williamson. Lewis, a Black jockey, rode Aristides to victory in the first Kentucky Derby in 1875. Williamson, born enslaved, became a successful trainer, nabbing wins with horses including Aristides in that inaugural Derby. Murphy, also born enslaved, is considered one of the greatest jockeys of all time, winning three Kentucky Derbys and an estimated 44% of his races. This experience is offered monthly and is $20 per person, starting March 27.

These two exciting new opportunities are part of Louisville Tourism's Unfiltered Truth Collection, which features several local attractions highlighting African American contributions to the city and culture.

In line with the Museum's non-profit mission to engage, educate and excite everyone about the extraordinary experience that is the Kentucky Derby, the Museum has been sharing the important role African Americans have had on the Derby for decades. Since 1993, African Americans in Thoroughbred Racing, a permanent exhibit, has chronicled the impact African Americans have had on the Thoroughbred industry and the Kentucky Derby, and features some of the most significant artifacts in the Museum's collection.
Additionally, the Museum's Education Team teaches thousands of students each year about this important history through field trips and in-school teaching.

Coming in Spring 2021, Kentucky Derby Museum is redesigning and moving its African Americans in Thoroughbred Racing exhibit to a larger and more prominent location within the Museum, as well as expanding the footprint of the exhibit. This will allow the Museum to display more of its collection, add new components, and provide visitors the best experience possible. This exhibit will also feature oral history interviews conducted with Louisville's African American community. This expansion is also made possible through support from Churchill Downs and the James Graham Brown Foundation.

Additionally, a traveling African Americans in Thoroughbred Racing exhibit will be created to travel to museums, community centers, visitor centers and churches.

Jockey Oliver Lewis

Jimmy Winkfield aboard Alan A Dale

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Preakness History: Simms Made History And Changed The Way Jockeys Ride

Our readers here at the Paulick Report seem to love a good lookback at horse racing history. In considering the best subjects for our 2020 Triple Crown coverage, this seemed like a good time to make note of the crucial role Black horsemen have played in the early days of our sport, and in this series of races. Many of the sport's most revered heroes around the turn of the 20th century were ridden, cared for, trained, and sometimes owned by Black horsemen whose equine expertise sometimes stretched back generations. While some, like jockeys Jimmy Winkfield and Isaac Murphy, have been the subjects of well-researched biographies in recent years, others may be less known to racing fans. It is clear that their contributions played an essential role in the lives of horses that became influential in American Thoroughbred history and bloodlines.

Today, we conclude our series on Black horsemen of Triple Crown history. You can access our Derby profile of Ansel Williamson here and our Belmont profile of Edward Dudley Brown here. 

If you've ever looked at an oil painting depicting a racing scene from the 1800s, you've probably noticed that the riders don't look much like modern jockeys. They seem taller, with legs hanging down the sides of their horses and may be depicted leaning forward slightly or sitting straight up as though they are gentlemen out for a forward canter behind foxhounds.

Many historians have credited Tod Sloan with popularizing the modern riding position, in which a jockey takes short stirrups and crouches low over the horse's withers, but one of America's early Black jockeys also had an influence in changing the way horses are ridden in races.

Willie Simms was part of the second wave of Black horsemen after the end of slavery, and he was given a leg up by men who had started their lives and racing careers in slavery. Born in 1870 outside Augusta, Ga., Simms was initially said to be attracted to racing because at a young age he was fascinated by the rainbow of brightly-colored silks that whipped around racecourses. He first began riding races at 17 and burst onto national racing scene at the age of 21 when he won the 1891 Spinaway aboard Promenade and went on to become the fifth-leading jockey in the nation.

His talent was quickly recognized and he was given a $10,500 retainer by owner Pierre Lorillard – a fee bigger than that of white competitors at the time. Besides Lorillard, his list of clients included every major stable owner of the age, highlighted by John E. Madden, James R. Keene, and August Belmont. He picked up steam rapidly in the early 1890s, winning the Belmont Stakes in back-to-back years with Commanche and Henry of Navarre and the Kentucky Derby in 1896 with Ben Brush, the favorite horse originally owned and trained by Edward Dudley Brown. (Brown sold Ben Brush before the Derby, but the horse was the centerpiece in his career, which included time as a rider, a trainer, and an owner.)

Simms is also the only Black jockey ever to have won the Preakness, which he did in 1898 with Sly Fox. As such, he's also the only Black rider to have won the three races now recognized as the Triple Crown, although not in the same year.

For the first 11 years of the publication of Goodwin's annual turf guide, the leading rider spot was a Black jockey five times, with Simms picking up the title in 1893 and 1894.

Due in part to his overwhelming success in the States, Sloan talked Simms into taking his tack to England. Historical accounts depict Sloan, who was white, as having a complicated relationship with race, openly using racial slurs to and about his Black valet but kicking back for a beer with Simms after the races.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Black riders were much less common in England at the time than they were in the States, and Simms' welcome wasn't an entirely pleasant one. The crowd gawked at him as he went to the post, and the press sniffed disapproval at his presence on the course. Once they got a look at the way he rode, their disapproval deepened to horror.

It seems unlikely that Simms was the first or the only race rider to shorten his stirrups and crouch over his horses. Sloan was already doing it back in the States, and before him, top jockeys Abe Hawkins and Gilbert Patrick (“Gilpatrick”) probably also hovered over their horses from time to time. Originally, the style actually came from races between the precursors to Quarter Horses in colonial times or even from certain Native American riding styles, according to writer Edward Hotaling in “The Great Black Jockeys.”

It was a logical move – the rider's weight would be distributed across the top of the saddle through the stirrup leathers, rather than a dead weight over the center of the horse's back, and a crouch allowed the rider to be more aerodynamic and balance more securely. These arguments were immaterial to the very traditional British racing scene at the time. The low, squat way a rider with “the American seat” balanced on a horse drew people to liken Simms to a monkey balancing on a stick (though it's unclear how much of the comparison was related to racism and how much was a commentary on his equitation). Even upon his death, that's the descriptor reporters would harken back to.

If his reception troubled him, you wouldn't know it from Simms' performance – he became the first American rider (of any color) to win a race in England aboard an American horse for American connections. Despite the accomplishment, he didn't pick up as many mounts in England as he could in America, so he came back to the States, where he was edged out for that year's riding title by fellow Black jockey “Soup” Perkins.

Jockey Willie Simms (at center)

When Sloan brought the same technique to England a couple of years later, it was met with disapproval but ultimately grudging acceptance, given Sloan's success – and, possibly, the fact he was a more acceptable color to the audience.

Simms' victories on the track paid him well – by one estimate, he's thought to have raked in $20,000 a year at the height of his career (over $600,000 in today's money). He had no family and invested his winnings well, buying real estate wherever he could. He purchased an estate in his hometown of Augusta with a gymnasium, riding stable, and a six-horse carriage. He wasn't alone in his arrival to wealth thanks to riding races – his generation of riders in particular, who had been born after the end of slavery and able to keep their own winnings from the beginning, inspired not just adoration from fans of the turf but upward mobility. Not everyone liked that.

Turfwriter Hugh Keough was open about his hostility and discomfort with the rise of Black jockeys in the sport.

“The praise that was bestowed upon the colored jockeys for their skill was accepted as a compliment to the entire race, and the porter that made up your berth took his share of it and assumed a perkiness that got on your nerves,” he wrote.

“Since jobs as Pullman porters were highly valued and often depended upon the ability to assume a posture of servility for the delectation of any white ticketholder, it seems highly unlikely that Keough actually saw real evidence that railroad porters' behavior changed depending on the performances of Black horsemen,” opined Katherine Mooney of Keough's assertion in her book 'Race Horse Men'. “But Keough believed that he saw it, because he was afraid that he might. And that was all that mattered.”

As time went on, white discomfort with Black success in racing grew. While fans of the sport might be in awe of a jockey's magical abilities with a horse, they were also threatened by this shift in the power balance – not just that Black riders could beat white riders on the turf, but that they could accumulate wealth, be proud of their accomplishments, and [potentially] use that success to push back against Jim Crow laws that kept things very much separate and unequal. White riders began targeting Black jockeys in races with dangerous crowding, boxing in, and other tactics they hoped would make their rivals give up, pull up, or be injured or killed. (To say nothing of the risk to their horses.) They began warning owners not to hire Black riders – a combination, perhaps, of racism and a desire to eliminate fearsome competitors.

Of course, this would later spill over into licensing decisions. Gradually, commissions stopped granting licenses to Black jockeys until they slowly disappeared from the starting gate.

As for Simms, he was reported to have retired around 1903 due to weight struggles. In 1907, the man once ranked as the top jockey in the country was barred from racetracks after he allegedly provided a counterfeit ticket when trying to attend the races at Gravesend. According to a report from The Brooklyn Citizen, Simms had supposedly lost his fortune to gambling by then and was attending the races as a tout. When racing officials learned of this, they revoked his complimentary entry badge he had previously held. Simms denied the story. He died of pneumonia in 1927 – by which time Black jockeys were a rarity, according to one report of his career published shortly after his death.

Simms was inducted into the National Museum of Racing's Hall of Fame in 1977. He remains the only Black rider to have won all three Triple Crown races.

Thanks to the Keeneland Library and the International Museum of the Horse's Chronicle of African Americans In The Horse Industry project for their assistance in research for this series.

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Legacy Equine Academy’s Ronald Mack Working To Increase Diversity, Inclusion In Thoroughbred Racing

Earlier this year in an effort to take meaningful strides toward increasing diversity and inclusion in Thoroughbred racing, the NTRA began working with the Legacy Equine Academy to create a scholarship through the University of Kentucky that would support students of color who show an interest in a career within the equine industry.

The Legacy Equine Academy, which encourages students in grades 6 – 12 to attend college and pursue equine, agriculture, natural resources, and environmental science degrees, is the brainchild of Ronald Mack. Mack recently shared with the NTRA his inspiration behind the Legacy Equine Academy and some of the long-term hopes he has for the program.

Q: What was the impetus behind your decision to found the Legacy Equine Academy?

A: “As a kid, I literally grew up on the grounds of the old Kentucky Association in the Eastend of Lexington, KY. The street I lived on (Aspendale Drive) was an oval. We were aware that our street was an old horse racing track. However, we had no idea that when we played in the field out back, we were playing on the infield of a historically famous racecourse.

“A few years ago, I read a book titled Perfect Timing to my son Stoney. The book is about the life of Isaac Murphy. Many consider Murphy, a Black horseman, the greatest jockey of all time. Inspired by Murphy's story, I began to research Thoroughbred racing in the late 1800s and early 1900s era. The names, stories and accomplishments of hundreds of Black horsemen in and around Lexington, KY may be lost but there is little doubt of their significance to Thoroughbred racing. Through my research, it was obvious to me that the Thoroughbred industry, and indeed, the wealth and success found today would not exist without the Black horsemen's hard work and expertise! These Trailblazers overcame adversity and found great success, which quickly vanished from memory in the early 20th century.

“Much of that history happened where I played as a kid.  I wanted to establish a grand event (The Legacy Ball) to pay homage to those Thoroughbred legends.   I also founded The Legacy Equine Academy, Inc. to connect African American and other racially diverse youth to their heritage of the Black horseman.”

Q: A major objective of the Legacy program is to encourage and expose students in grades 6-12 to the equine and agricultural industries. What can the Thoroughbred industry do specifically to help advance that objective?

A: “We encourage the Thoroughbred industry to support our efforts! Both financially and by providing resources and industry related activities, such as apprenticeships, job shadowing, tours, etc., to help potential future industry leaders. We welcome opportunities for our LEA students to discover firsthand how equine and agriculture technology relate to the world around them and discover the excitement of academic excellence, leadership, technical development, and teamwork. In turn, LEA provides a 'pipeline' of qualified and certified student leaders for career employment opportunities in the Thoroughbred and Agriculture industries.”

Q: So much of the Thoroughbred industry is rooted in the contributions of the African-American community and people of color. How can the racing community better amplify those voices?

A: “Reaching out and supporting an organization like LEA is an example of how the industry can solidify their commitment of exposing two of the world's most prominent industries to a new audience and a new generation. As an industry partner, LEA fosters a commitment to young people that promotes the Equine and Agriculture industries and career related opportunities it offers. These industries take a special kind of skill, passion and patience.  As a community partner, the racing establishment could begin to set a standard throughout the world by exemplifying the importance of greater professional workforce racial diversity.”

Q: What has been the most rewarding aspect of your work with the students in the Legacy program?

A: “To experience the moment when a young person has a 'discovery' of new ideas and opportunities as a result of our program makes it worth the hard work, commitment and dedication to the LEA mission. As I mentioned before, bridging the rich heritage of the Black Horsemen to today's standards in the industries they help build, has been a mission that, hopefully, will become my 'Legacy'.”

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