Ruffian

"Champion 1974-1975"

click to see back of hat

Price: $19.95

How to Order

A portion of the proceeds from the sale of the Ruffian hat will go to the Grayson Jockey Club and TOBA (Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association)

Ruffian book available at Exclusively Equine

SEE VIDEO

As though our dreams had the force of reality, we conceived her and then when she appeared took her for our own. We made her on massive proportions, the body of a stud, the legs of a water spider, so that no one would mistake her for ordinary. And we made her black as the crack of doom. We made her fast, speed on speed, so fast that distance would lose all meaning and time would take on meaning anew. We endowed her with a savagery which would drive her to fight pain and would humble her foes like serfs at the feet of a queen. And then we gave her to a man above whom no other could be more trusted to minister to her greatness and to preserve the sanctity of our dream.
She gave us power because what we dreamt she performed, so we asked for more. Track records, stakes records. Why not a world record, a consummate feat which would prove us to be the supreme dreamers of all? We approved when the track was tempered like an anvil, a little help from man to fulfill her destiny.
Her speed, her unearthly physical size, our vanity and finally her own savagery destroyed her.
We live now with a busted dream, but the man in the pink shirt who made that lonesome trip to the far side of Belmont’s infield a Sunday ago lives with a real loss. We will dream again, but Frank Whiteley will never have another Ruffian

Cary Robertson Jr.
Thoroughbred Record, 1975