Saturday, July 20, 2013

Earle Avery



New Brunswick harness racing legend, Earle Avery, proved that you can never be too old to dream and have it come true.

In 1948, at the age of 54, when many start pondering their retirement, Avery and his wife, Elizabeth, left a life of farming and racing horses in Woodstock, NB and the state of Maine, picked up and moved to harness racing’s greener pastures in the United States.

Avery became associated with, arguably, the greatest pacing horse in the history of harness racing, Meadow Skipper, when he convinced owner Norman Woolworth to purchase him 50 years ago, in the spring of 1963. 

Meadow Skipper went on to become a world champion race horse for Avery, pacing Lexington Kentucky’s famed Red Mile in 1:55.1 in October 1963, and later became one of the most prolific stallions of the 20th century.  His influence on breeding is still being felt today as many current stars of harness racing can trace their roots back to Meadow Skipper.

It was the continuation of what would become a Hall of Fame career for Avery that saw him win over 4,000 races and $3.5 million in career earnings and establishing nine world records before he retired back to his hometown in October 1972.

The culmination of his career came on June 5, 1976 when he was the first member of the harness racing fraternity inducted into the New Brunswick Sports Hall of Fame; the normal five-year waiting period after retirement being waived for the much-respected Avery.

 
But that was just one of many prestigious accolades that he received over 50-plus years in harness racing.

In 1977, he was inducted into the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame and later that same year he became the 25th person to be elected to the Living Hall of Fame of the Trotters in Goshen, New York.  

On August 26, 1995 Earle Avery became a member of the Woodstock Wall of Fame.

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Earle Bradford Avery was born on February 4, 1894 in the farming community of Knowlesville, NB, which is located about 25 miles northeast of Woodstock.  Avery was the third oldest in a family of seven children and he was exposed to horses early on as there were always a few around the family farm. 

It was at the age of five when his father took him to see his first horse race in the nearby community of Bristol, where they raced for a short period of time at the turn on the century.  It wasn’t long before Avery was racing some of his father’s horses against some of their neighbor’s horses on the community roads in big-wheeled sulkies and then in the winter time on the frozen river.

“When I was a young man in New Brunswick in, we used to race on the ice in the Saint John River,” he once said.  “I’ve raced when the temperature would drop as low as 40 degrees below zero.  It was the best fun you’ve ever seen.  We put caulks on the shoes of the horses and the caulks would cut into the ice for the smoothest, most rhythmic ride of all…the horses didn’t mind the cold.  Neither did the drivers.”

By the end of the First World War, Avery was living on the outskirts of Woodstock, near the Old Houlton Road, maintaining a 600-acre potato farm in an area that is now partially occupied by the Bull Road subdivision in Bedell.  It was the beginning of an era when harness racing was beginning to thrive, especially in Atlantic Canada, and a new racetrack had opened at Island Park, located in the Saint John River between Grafton and Woodstock. 

Avery wanted to race at the new facility so he went out and purchased his first horse, a nine-year-old trotter by the name of Black Peter, for $250.  They were scheduled to race on opening day of Island Park, August 19, 1919.


A few weeks later, his wife was expecting their first child.  The 25-year-old Avery drove Black Peter into Woodstock to get a doctor and brought him back to the farm.  After a son, Robert, was born, he drove Black Peter and the doctor back to town and then went on to race at Island Park.  After all that, Black Peter still won three of five heats and for his efforts he won a blanket and $160.

Avery went on to have an outstanding career in the Maritimes and Maine over the next 30 years.   He established numerous tracks records including one with Ray Henley (2:05) at Island Park in 1938, which stood for 28 years.

By 1948, he had raised two sons, Robert and Blair, but they were now living on their own.  He had been training horses for C.T. Black, a local auto dealer in Woodstock, and they had ventured down to the New England states to race on occasion.  Avery liked what he saw and began to get comfortable.  Harness racing’s ‘big leagues’ were calling and it was time to follow a dream.

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Over the next few years Avery began to make a name for himself  on the eastern U.S. seaboard by winning a few driving titles and in 1955 Norman Woolworth, the proprietor of Clearview Farm of New Canaan, Connecticut, hired Avery to become the head trainer and driver for his new racing operation.

Avery had been recommended to Woolworth by Walter Gibbons, who had been the race-secretary at Roosevelt Raceway during that time.  Woolworth and his brother, Fred, were just starting to build a horse racing stable and needed a good trainer and the reputable Avery seemed like a good fit.  Fred Woolworth dropped out of the stable a few years later when he bought into the Detroit Tigers baseball team.

The Earle Avery-Norman Woolworth relationship would become one of the best known in harness racing over the next 15 years and Avery would praise Woolworth as an owner “who never interfered with me at the horse sales or during racing season.”

EARLE AVERY and NORMAN WOOLWORTH

Their relationship was an immediate success. 

Egyptian Princess had been a $2,000 yearling purchase in 1954 for Woolworth and the trotting daughter of Victory Song set a world record for three-year-olds when she won the Reading Fair Futurity in 2:03.1h.  She was named the top trotting filly from 1955 to 1957 and went on to break three more world records.  She retired with a record of 3,2:00.4m and $156,471 in lifetime earnings.
EGYPTIAN PRINCESS

Muncy Hanover, a son of Adios, was another yearling purchase ($25,000) who became a world champion for Woolworth and Avery when he won a heat of the 1960 Little Brown Jug in 1:58.3h.  He went on to earn $221,615 lifetime.

MUNCY HANOVER after winning a heat of the Little Brown Jug in a World Record

Their first major win came with the aged pacer, Hillsota, who won the first leg of the $75,000 American Pacing Classic in a time of 1:59 at Hollywood Park in 1955.  Among the many other successful horses for the Woolworth-Avery team included:

A world champion trotter, Porterhouse ($367,584), who twice earned over $115,000 in one season;
PORTERHOUSE

Bright Knight ($162,549), who won the Empire Pace at Yonkers in 1959 for a record purse of $123,712;


Gun Runner ($156,112), a winner of four major trotting stakes in 1968;

EARLE AVERY and GUN RUNNER after winning the 1968 Scotland Trot at Yonkers

Stake winners, Filet Mignon, Speedy Princess, Miss Blue Jay, High Level, Pay Dirt, and Sh Boom.


SPEEDY PRINCESS

MISS BLUE JAY

HIGH LEVEL

And then there was Meadow Skipper.

MEADOW SKIPPER

“After I had him a month, I knew he had the potential to be one of the greatest who ever lived.”

 Trainer-driver, Earle Avery, talking about Meadow Skipper in 1963

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Earle Avery was racing in the New York area in early-summer 1963 and on June 11, in a trial of the Commodore Pace at Roosevelt Raceway, Meadow Skipper defeated some of the best three-year-olds racing at time in 2:01.3 for his fourth straight win for trainer Delvin Miller.

Avery was there that night and saw a horse with great potential so he reached out to Norman Woolworth, expressing his deep interest.

The stories on the conversation that took place between Avery and Woolworth about acquiring Meadow Skipper have varied over the years but one thing was for certain; Avery had never approached his owner about buying any horse before, especially a horse like Meadow Skipper who would probably command a top price.

Woolworth had great faith and trust in his trainer so he inquired about this horse that he knew little about but one that he had such determined interest in.  After all, Meadow Skipper had to be a special horse if Avery wanted him.  He reached out to Grant and after a day or two he agreed to sell him, but on the condition that Woolworth never disclose the price; not even to Avery.

Years later, after both Woolworth and Avery had passed away, the Avery family confirmed that he never knew the true price to acquire Meadow Skipper though it was thought to be around $100,000.   

The gentleman that he was, Woolworth was true to his word. 

Meadow Skipper and Earle Avery had an inauspicious beginning, finished fourth in their very first start at Buffalo and he admitted to a taken-back Woolworth afterwards that he wasn’t very impressed with his new charge.

And thus, the most famous equipment change in history took place.

Avery, wondering how he could ever improve on a horse developed by the legendary Miller, decided to train Meadow Skipper with leather hopples instead of the customary plastic ones, figuring they might help him learn to leave quicker from the gate.


“I was afraid to race him with the leather,” Avery was quoted as saying.  “I had to make sure he was used to it before I took the chance.  So I trained with the leather hopples but used plastic in the races.  He lost two races and then I felt he was ready.  So off he went with the leather and he never was steadier or faster at the gate.  I was so confident that I spoke to my groom just before that big one (race) in Lexington.

“’If I can get this horse in front at the quarter pole,’ I said, ‘I’ll do (1:)55.’”

It wasn’t the first time Avery tried a different technique to straighten a horse out

Sh Boom was a challenging horse for Avery in that sometimes he didn’t want to do any work at all, whether it was to jog or race.  When he was hitched to a sulky he would stand still and wouldn’t move.  So Avery decided that he would hitch Sh Boom beside a workhouse and have the pair of them pull a manure wagon around.  

He resisted that too…at first.  The workhorse dragged Sh Boom along and pretty soon the stubborn colt was willing to trot on his own.  Avery had no further problem with him after that and Sh Boom went on to earn over $111,000 and raced for many years.

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In what was becoming known as more than a heated rivalry, Meadow Skipper and rival, Overtrick, had taken turns winning the first two legs of harness racing’s Triple Crown over each other in 1963. 

On September 13th, Meadow Skipper won the $163,187 Cane Pace - which was the richest ever harness race at the time – in 1:58.4h and the epic battle between them was described by Dean Hoffman as “one of the most unforgettable races in Yonkers Raceway’s history” with Meadow Skipper on the inside and Overtrick on the outside battling over the final half-mile.  Overtrick took a slight lead in the stretch only to see Meadow Skipper fight back hard to win by a three-quarter length margin.  It was said that fans stood and applauded this outstanding performance.

Overtrick took both heats of the Little Brown Jug on September 19th in 1:57.1h-1:57.3h and the Meadow Skipper camp conceded after the race that Overtrick had been in peak form and couldn’t be beat on that day.

With a six-week gap to the $146,324 Messenger Stakes that would be taking place at Yonkers Raceway, the two would meet up again on October 3rd at Lexington in a $8,200 tune up for the final leg of harness racing’s Triple Crown.

Avery and Meadow Skipper held off a ferocious challenge in the stretch by Overtrick to win in 1:55.1, a new world record for three-year-olds and an all-age record at The Red Mile.  It was also the second fastest mile ever paced in the world.

Meadow Skipper had assumed the lead before the half-mile mark of :57.1 and, instead of slowing the pace down to gain some measure of an advantage, a confident Earle Avery kept him rolling through a torrid three-quarter mile marker of 1:26.1 before Overtrick ranged up on the outside to challenge him for the stretch drive.

It was said that, with a sixteenth of a mile to go, both horses were dead even but Meadow Skipper would not relent and only a nose separated the two at the wire in the world record mile.

Meadow Skipper had fulfilled Avery’s prediction that he had made to his groom only a few weeks earlier.

In the final leg of the Triple Crown on November 2nd, Overtrick ended up winning the Messenger Stakes in 2:00.4h.  Meadow Skipper was second.

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Although Meadow Skipper was the greatest horse Avery ever had he wasn’t necessarily his favorite, “Porterhouse was the kindest,” he once said.  “He couldn’t have been more perfect.”
EARLE AVERY with PORTERHOUSE after winning the 1962 Roosevelt Trot

Those same words were often used to describe the likeable Avery and he was recognized by the United States Harness Writers Association in 1963 when they bestowed upon him the inaugural “Clem McCarthy Good Guy Award.”  The award is given “…to one deemed the one most cooperative with newspapermen across the National and who by the force of his personality nearly exemplifies the best characteristics of the late esteemed Clem McCarthy.”

The Town of Woodstock declared December 28, 1963 “Earle Avery Day” and The Bugle published a special edition of its newspaper to honor Woodstock’s most famous citizen.  Among the many messages he received was a congratulatory telegram from then New Brunswick Premier, Louis J. Robichaud.

In 1970 Avery received the Golden Service Award by fellow harness racing drivers - who affectionately called him “Pops” - for meritorious service and dedication to harness racing.

He finally retired in October 1972, at the age of 78, but not before many of his friends and fellow drivers and trainers paid tribute to him with an Earle Avery Night on September 26, 1972 at Yonkers Raceway in New York.   He was presented with the Grand Circuit Award of Merit Medal among other gifts and awards for his long and satisfying career.

At the time Avery thought that the decision to retire was a bit too hasty on his part.  “When I retired in ’72, I just said to everybody that I was retiring this fall and the first thing I knew they were giving a night for me,” he was quoted as saying.  “If it hadn’t been for the party maybe I wouldn’t have retired after all!

“I’d rather train a few horses than do anything.”

For all the rewards and acknowledgements he received through the years, the one he coveted most was the one that he didn’t live along enough to receive.

His election to the Living Hall of Fame of the Trotters in Goshen, New York was announced on November 6, 1977, only a few hours after he passed away at the age of 83. 

He never knew.

He was posthumously inducted on July 2, 1978 and a lifelike full-color statuette is on permanent exhibition at the Hall.  His sons traveled to the ceremony and accepted the prestigious decoration on his behalf.

Through a life that was full of accomplishment and personal success, he was still regarded by most as a gentleman who was proud of his Carleton County roots.

To this day, Earle Avery is still celebrated as one of Woodstock’s most accomplished citizens.

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For more blogs on New Brunswick harness racing go to thefrederictonscene.blogspot.ca

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