Down the Line Racecourses: Richfield, Mentone, Epsom, Aspendale by John Macnaughtan

Description SHORTLISTED – SMALL HISTORY PUBLICATION AWARD, VICTORIAN COMMUNITY HISTORY AWARDS 2024 The incredible growth in racecourses in the nineteenth century Melbourne metropolis was utterly linked not only to the legendary Aussie gambling mania on racehorses, but also to the tentacle-like spread of railway lines on which the ‘iron horse’ ran. There could be no better example of this than the southern Melbourne seaside coast that encompassed the suburbs of Mentone, Mordialloc and Aspendale, a stretch that from 1887 to 1891 spawned four tracks – Richfield, Mentone, Aspendale and Epsom. In this book not only does John Macnaughtan forensically document the birth and history of these tracks and the men that founded them, but also has written biographies of one horse, one trainer and one jockey associated with each of the latter three. for Mentone, it is Racing Hall of Fame trio in Rising Fast, trainer Fred Hoysted and jockey Bill Williamson; for Epsom his selections are another Hall of Fame trio in Eurythmic, trainer Jack Holt and jockey Jack Purtell; for Aspendale his selections are 1901 Melbourne Cup winner Revenue, trainer Lou Robertson (member of the Racing Hall of Fame) and jockey Keith Voitre. Incredibly the three selected trainers between them have won thirty-one Melbourne premierships while the selected jockeys captured thirteen Melbourne premierships. While the passion for the subject is clearly evident in John’s writing, readers will also be delighted with his accompanying rare collection of old photographs and statistics.   Paperback, 144pp, 2023