Best Australian Racing Stories (44 page)

Bendrodt often recalled how he went to the 1937 yearling sales to buy a colt, but peered into a horse's box and fell for the small bay filly inside. He bought her for £450, named her Gay Romance, and later that year she won the Gimcrack Stakes at Randwick.

Bendrodt wagered everything he had on that race and collected a fortune in bets. The winnings helped finance Prince's restaurant, which he opened in Martin Place in 1938 and which soon became the showpiece of his empire.

Prince's was an instant success, but during the war it came in for a lot of criticism from over-patriotic ‘blue-noses' who declared no one should enjoy themselves while the troops were away fighting. Bendrodt retorted that Prince's was a valuable recreation spot for troops on leave—they certainly spent a fortune there and made him rich—and the US forces recognised this by placing it at the top of their lists of recommended entertainment establishments.

Bendrodt often claimed that when Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt visited Australia he was the only civilian she sent for—to thank him for helping US troops in their brief spells of leave.

As a punter, Bendrodt often only bet in £5 notes, though every now and then he would ‘have a go', but rarely on anyone else's horse. He used to say: ‘Punting is one of those things there is no percentage in. I can go broke easier ways than that.'

Nevertheless, he collected £15,000 when Rimfire won the 1948 Melbourne Cup; he explained that he'd selected Rimfire on his breeding three weeks before the Cup and had backed it at 150 to 1.

Other good horses owned by Bendrodt included Snow Star, which won at Canterbury and Randwick in 1948, and Goshawk, one of the first horses to go to the United States from Australia.

One incident which highlighted Bendrodt's great love of horses concerned Tommy Smith's famous first winner, Bragger, a horse that campaigned through the 1940s for Smith and was still racing in top-class races, such as the Newcastle Cameron Handicap and Randwick Tramway handicap, when he was ten years old.

Bragger was returning to Smith's stable after a spell when the float, carrying three horses, caught fire on Parramatta Road near Auburn. Driver Kevin Spain smelled smoke, jumped out and threw open the float doors. The straw was blazing and though he was easily able to lead out two horses, one of which was owned by Bendrodt, Bragger was straddled in fright across a partition and was very badly burned.

Smith fought for weeks to save Bragger and horse-lover Bendrodt enlisted the help of a doctor friend; all three men applied ointments and medicines for the best part of a month, often around the clock, before they finally gave up the hopeless cause and put an end to the horse's suffering.

In 1950, Bendrodt imported the sire Abbots Fell, acknowledged among breeders as the greatest living descendant of Carbine and, at that time, the highest-priced thoroughbred imported into Australia for stud. Bendrodt also imported numerous other horses from England, including the stallion Scarlet Emperor and the broodmare Tollgate.

Jim Bendrodt gave up racing during the 1950s because he said both training horses and selling his stud's produce to other racing men involved ‘too much sadness and distress for an animal lover'. He publicly castigated racehorse owners for selling broken-down champions without thought or care as to what may become of them—he himself had refused to sell his beloved War Eagle at the end of his career, despite an offer for the then huge sum of £12,000.

For a time Bendrodt retreated to his old-world cottage in Eastbourne Avenue, Darling Point, where his collection of Royal Meissen porcelain and Bohemian crystal took pride of place. But in the late 1950s he opened a new haunt for the racing fraternity, Caprice Restaurant—opposite Royal Sydney Golf Club and beside the flying-boat base, on the water at Lyne Park, Rose Bay. The restaurant was fitted out at great expense and was described as ‘a caravanserai for the connoisseurs of cuisine'.

Bendrodt sold Caprice in 1967. His wife, Peggy, later said, ‘He was very upset at having to sell—but he knew his health was becoming worse and he could not continue with the special attention he always gave his patrons.' He took a trip back to Canada in 1968 and, upon his return to Australia, reappeared at the track as a small-time owner-trainer.

Jim Bendrodt died on a Saturday morning in February 1973. Later that afternoon his filly Tropic Star ran third at Randwick at 330 to 1.

A ‘point-to-point'

A.B. (‘BANJO') PATERSON

LAST SATURDAY'S POINT-TO-POINT STEEPLECHASE
at Eastwood brought out a field of seven starters, each of whom had his partisans among the crowd of ladies that clustered at the top of the hill.

Eastwood House stands on a round-topped volcanic hill, whose smooth, steep sides are terraced with gardens and shrubberies. The course runs round the foot of the hill and, except for about a quarter of a mile, the horses are in view all the way; but, to keep them in sight, the spectators have to move round the hill, so that on Saturday the amusing spectacle was witnessed of hundreds of fashionably dressed ladies and gentlemen running backwards and forwards on the smooth, green hilltop, shrieking encouragement to the riders, who, far away below them, were toiling gallantly over fences, ditches, avenues, logs, and anything else that came in the road.

The day was fine and clear, the air like wine, and over everything was a scent of grasses and flowers; also there was plenty of excitement, and not a little to laugh at; so what more would anybody want?

To encourage owners to ride their own horses instead of seeking the assistance of the ‘professional amateurs', who usually figure in the saddle in such races, it was a condition of the race that any owner riding overweight would be allowed a 1-second start for every pound overweight he carried.

This somewhat novel idea worked fairly well, though the second per pound allowance is not enough. The dauntless seven were lined up by Mister Forward, the starter, with their tails almost touching a big built-up log fence, and then, by the aid of a stopwatch, they were dispatched in a sort of timetable order.

First to go was Andover, a fine big grey horse, about the best specimen of a weight-carrying horse in the lot, but he was very fat, and was carrying more than 15 stone, so that his only chance was for all the others to fall or baulk. He had a 48-second start, and on the word being given he started off on his lonely journey at a good round pace, jumping the first few fences in good style, and disappeared among the timber.

Next to go was Mercadool, another veteran, whose only hope consisted in his being a safe conveyance. He left sharp to time, 17 seconds after Andover. Barney followed 11 seconds later. He is a chestnut horse, and at one time the property of the well-known and well-liked ‘Jack' Fitzsimmons, who committed suicide in the gardens. Barney is well known on many showgrounds, but is getting rather past steeplechasing.

Riverstone followed 11 seconds later, a good class of horse, and looking very well. He was ridden by a young gentleman from the old country, whose turnout for neatness and correctness put the rest of the field in the shade; and he rode with pluck, if not with judgement, as will be seen later on.

Tatta, Larry and Sparrow were the scratch horses, i.e. those that carried no overweight, and they left 48 seconds after Andover.

It could hardly be called a race at first. Andover was out of sight, Mercadool just disappearing, and Barney and Riverstone stringing after him like a wild geese, when the scratch horses left; but the water jump altered all that and brought them together in one common bond of disaster.

The spectators on the hill witnessed the start, and then ran round to watch for the first horses to come through the orchard. It seemed a long time. At last Andover appeared, jumping grandly, though it was rumoured that he had already parted once with his rider on the journey, and had been remounted. Be that as it may, he was making no mistake about his fences when he burst in view of the populace. He was followed by Mercadool and Barney, and people held their breath as the trio strung down to the water jump.

This jump is at the foot of the hill, and is of no great width, but the taking off side is higher than the landing side, and the latter was muddy and slippery on Saturday, and not at all an inviting place to jump onto. So, at all events, thought Andover, and on being ridden at it, he dropped dead. He was hurriedly wheeled around, and rushed at it again, but again dropped dead, this time shooting his rider into the wavelets that lapped invitingly below, the rider pulling the bridal off in his fall.

Mercadool and Barney scrambled over more or less ungracefully, and then came Riverstone at full speed. As soon as he saw the water he made up his mind to stop, but the ‘new chum' on his back was equally determined to go on, and he rubbed the spurs and whalebone into Riverstone in a style that made the noble animal fling himself in despairing fashion off the bank, much like a suicide jumping off South Head; he landed half in and half out of the water, shooting his rider over his head, while a yell of excitement went up from the spectators on the hilltop.

The rider stuck to the bridle and remounted, but the rein was broken, and the martingale also broke with the result that the saddle slipped back and the horse ran the best part of 2 miles over fences with the loose end of a broken rein flapping round his legs, and his rider most insecurely perched on his hindquarters.

Hardly had he got away again, when the three scratch horses swooped down on the jump. Larry and Tatta baulked, and Sparrow wished to follow their example, but his rider was of the determined order, and he let the old grey have a few rib-roasters that lifted him clean up in the air, only to fall half in and half out of the water as Riverstone had done. And again the shrill feminine yell, ‘He's off; he's off ', rose from the hilltop.

Sparrow's rider stuck to the bridle grimly, and remounted, and after getting over at the second attempt, the field was pretty well closed up, with the exception of Andover, who, being without a bridle, had run away and was eating grass.

The rest of the race demands little description. Mercadool's rider mistook the course and pulled off at the ‘Avenue Double', the red flags on the fence either not being conspicuous enough to catch his eye, or else conveying the impression that they were danger signals. The others rushed the double in style, but the two leaders, Larry and Tatta, baulked in the lane, and would be there yet, only that Sparrow was kept straight and gave them a lead.

Riverstone was in two minds about stopping, but not being used to having a rider sitting on his hips, he thought it better to go on, and he got across somehow, though he practically fell over the second fence. There were ‘riders in the stand' watching the race and criticising, who wouldn't have been on the horse for £1000; but his rider still kept on with him, though he was hopelessly in the rear.

From here on, Tatta drew to the front, and it was obvious that, barring a fall, he must win. He is a thoroughbred horse to all appearances and, notwithstanding his great age of 18 years, was in good trim, and ‘stood off ' his fences and sprang like a stag. Sparrow chased him home pertinaciously, but the grey lost too much ground at the water and at the fences; and the end of the struggle saw old Tatta, very tired, lobbing on in front of Sparrow, with Larry, just in sight, third.

No others finished. There was no time taken.

The usual ‘take-down' bookmakers put in an appearance, and laid 6 to 4 against Tatta, and refused to pay when he won, on the grounds that he was the only horse backed, and they had wasted their afternoon for nothing. They were escorted off the premises with threats and bad language; but if the cherry-picking inhabitants of Ryde and Eastwood were half the men that their forefathers used to be, they would have given those bookmakers a wash, if nothing else.

A hurdle race was run after the steeplechase, but the jumps were so flimsy that if a crow sat on them they would fall down, so there was no excitement, except that a big chestnut horse knocked off the top rail with his front legs and got himself tangled up with it, he rolled himself and his rider over and over for a few revolutions. Then the guests drank the health of Mister Eric Terry, the winner of the steeplechase, who rode a good race, and then all and sundry made for home.

The Cab Horse's Story

C.J. Dennis

Now, you wouldn't imagine, to look at me,

That I was a racehorse once.

I have done my mile in—let me see—

No matter. I was no dunce.

But you'd not believe me if I told

Of gallops I did in days of old.

I was first in—ah, well! What's the good?

It hurts to recall those days

When I drew from men, as a proud horse should,

Nothing but words of praise:

Oh, the waving hats, and the cheering crowd!

How could a horse help being proud?

My owner was just as proud as I;

I was cuddled and petted and praised.

My fame was great and my price was high,

And every year 'twas raised.

Then I strained a sinew in ninety-nine,

And that's when started my swift decline.

I was turned to grass for a year or so;

Then dragged to an auction sale;

And a country sport gave me a go;

But how could I hope but fail?

‘A crock,' said he. And I here began

To learn of the ways of cruel man.

A year I spent as a lady's hack—

I was growing old and spent—

But she said that the riding hurt her back;

So we parted; and I went

For a while—and it nearly broke my heart—

Dragging a greasy butcher's cart.

Then my stifle went. And I, proud horse,

Son of the nobly born,

The haughty king of a city course,

Knew even a butcher's scorn!

So down the ladder I quickly ran;

Till I came to be owned by a bottle man.