In July 1932, just a handful of months after Phar Lap died in agony in California, veterinarian W.J. Stewart McKay was publishing his book, Staying Power of the Racehorse.
It was an epic project, 300-plus pages of scientific and physiological studies that concluded the then modern racehorse, and the stayer in particular, required a certain type of heart to be successful. In that era, he found no better heart than that which rattled inside the Harry Telford-trained Phar Lap.
McKay's 1932 book, Staying Power of the Racehorse
‘Few could imagine that this gentle red chestnut, so amiable and so intelligent, could be galvanised into a racing machine with a speed never known in Australia,’ McKay wrote. ‘We have had the good fortune indeed to see one of the greatest stayers that ever graced the racecourse.’
For two years, McKay had recorded Phar Lap’s size and shape, the horse standing at 16.2¼ hands as a 4-year-old. A year later, the measuring stick was too short to record anything. He was 79 inches around the girth and his stride, though this is hearsay, was some 27 feet. And sadly, when he died, his heart was discovered to be just as fantastical.
Phar Lap (NZ) as a 5-year-old pictured with Tommy Woodcock (inset Billy Elliott, the horse's jockey for his sole American race)
McKay concluded in 1932 that Phar Lap was the perfect evolution of staying power. ‘Ewe-necked and plain’ as he was, he had demolished Australian racing fields for four consecutive seasons, and only weight and exhaustion had brought him back to his opposition.
Who, in the horse’s living memory, would ever forget the day he won the 1930 Melbourne Cup, and none would ever forget the day they learned he was dead.
Without doubt, the life of Phar Lap is the greatest story in Australian racing. It was so during his lifetime, and it still is today. Before Takeover Target (Celtic Swing {GB}) was a cult hero, Phar Lap was a dirt cheap yearling, and before Black Caviar (Bel Esprit) reeled off her perfect picket-fence career, Phar Lap was stringing together record-setting sequences.
Phar Lap (NZ), hooded and rugged, walking with Tommy Woodcock ahead of the 1930 Melbourne Cup | Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia
The red gelding had the greedy owner, the desperate trainer, the kind strapper and the stoic jockey, and his narrative resonated widely with whole classes of people roughly dumped onto their wits by the Depression.
But between the lines of this Hollywood script, Phar Lap was an over-raced, over-trained, sad heap of a racehorse. He won on brilliance, heart and goodwill, almost always with quarter cracks and on ‘tonics’ laced with arsenic and belladonna.
More than any horse in our history, Phar Lap’s story has been investigated and documented to within an inch of its life and, as a result, the theories that have abounded in the last 91 years are extraordinary.
Dave Davis, Phar Lap's (NZ) American owner | Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia
For example, was he poisoned to death by an American mobster, or did years of arsenic build-up finally take its toll in California? Did he graze on arsenic-sprayed pasture in the hours before he died, or did his strapper, Tom Woodcock, accidentally administer the wrong pain relief?
As recently as the last few years, a fascinating podcast by Kerry Negara delivered extraordinary evidence that Phar Lap was likely killed by his vet, Australian Bill Neilsen, who was drunk, reckless and incapable of care when the horse first presented as ill. Negara’s podcast states that the heart on display in Canberra, allegedly Phar Lap’s, is not Phar Lap’s at all but that of an unfortunate draught horse, called in when Neilsen didn't preserve the original organs well-enough.
There are other stories too, like the one that said Telford received the wrong horse when he rode to Glebe Island to collect the yearling Phar Lap off a boat. How, this rumour said, could a horse like Phar Lap eventuate from a drab, one-hit wonder like the mare Entreaty (NZ) (Winkie {GB})?
Bill Neilson | Image courtesy of the National Maritime Museum
Also, why did they never manage to conclude who shot at Phar Lap before the 1930 Melbourne Cup, and why was the rest of the horse, the hide and internal organs removed, buried unceremoniously on a hillside in Californa?
All of these things add to the magic, tragedy and horror of the Phar Lap story. There have been dozens of books and documentaries about him, and a 1983 film that ranks among the best.
Even without all these avenues, though, the son of Night Raid (GB) was a devastating horse on the racetrack, winning 36 stakes races and planting a legacy so strong that's it's never been bettered.
An image of Phar Lap (NZ) from Staying Power of the Racehorse
It’s likely Phar Lap didn’t race against vintage opposition, which improved out of sight after his death with the arrival of horses like Peter Pan, Chatham and Rogilla (Roger De Busili {GB}), but as is so often said of the great ones, they can only beat what shows up.
Phar Lap’s hide has been on display in Melbourne since the end of 1932. For anyone that knows it, it’s a sad reminder of his life with its blanket clip, needle nicks and pin-fire scars. But it remains a cultural icon in this country and, probably because of it, the old horse is continually introduced to new generations.
In three years, it will be a hundred years since Phar Lap was born in New Zealand, and the tale is as lively and brilliant today as it was in its heyday. It begs the question… what would Australian racing be without Phar Lap?
