October 24, 1877: "The Great Race" at Pimlico

Pimlico's entrance, including the sculpture

October 24, 1877: Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore hosts a 2½-mile match race -- a mile longer than the modern Belmont Stakes, and twice the length of the modern Kentucky Derby -- run by a trio of champions. 

Pimlico, a.k.a. "Old Hilltop," had opened on October 25, 1870, with a race called the Dinner Party Stakes. It was won by a colt named Preakness. In that horse's honor, since 1873, the track has hosted the Preakness Stakes, which went on to become the 2nd leg of American thoroughbred horse racing's "Triple Crown." The current building, seating 98,983, dates to 1967, and another renovation is planned for the 2020s.

A crowd of 20,000 people attends, a huge number for any sporting event in those days. Congress had been adjourned so that members could leave Washington and take the 45-mile train trip up the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad to attend. This was the Gilded Age.

The horses are:

* Ten Broeck, 5 years old, considered the champion of Kentucky, already known as the greatest of thoroughbred horse-producing States.

* Tom Ochiltree -- that's the name of the horse, not the jockey -- also 5, considered the Eastern champion, and winner of the 1875 Preakness Stakes on the same track. And...

* Parole, a 2-year-old gelding considered the champion of New York State, and a brother of Aristides, the 1st horse to win the Kentucky Derby (in 1875), and later to be a brother of Iroquois, who in 1881 became the 1st American-bred horse to win England's Epsom Derby (in 1881).

Parole makes a late run, and wins, 3 lengths ahead of Ten Broeck, and 6 ahead of Tom Ochiltree. The event is depicted in a four-ton stone bas relief, copied from a Currier & Ives print and sculpted in stone by Bernard Zuckerman, hanging over the clubhouse entrance at Pimlico. It is 30 feet long and 10 feet high, and is gilded in 24-karat gold leaf.

Ten Broeck was retired after this race, and lived until 1887. Tom Ochiltree was also retired after this race, and lived until 1897. Parole continued to race, in both America and Europe, until 1884, age 12, and lived until 1903. All 3 have been elected to the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame, just down the block from Saratoga Race Course in Saratoga Springs, New York.

*

October 24, 1877 was a Wednesday. The baseball season was already over. And while Saturday hadn't yet been standardized as the day of college football, none of the schools already established as playing it played a game on that day. So there were no scores.