Saving Baby

by Jo Anne Normile

  “I was having dinner at the Turf Club the other night,” he said to me one day, “and had so much fun with Bill McClaughlin.” The Turf Club was an exclusive, private dining club at the track that you had to pay a lot of money to join, and Bill McClaughlin was the track’s new general manager. John and I never saw him at meals because we didn’t belong. We always ate in the snack bar area, and on my own, I would pick up a bite in the track kitchen.

  “Lots of chitchat, as always,” Bill continued. “Then I mention your name. I like watching him when I do that. From his white collar it starts to get red on his neck, and it goes all the way to the top of his head. He just despises you!” Bill finished off with a hearty laugh.

  It would have made me nervous had Bill not so obviously relished needling McClaughlin.

  John was always interested in hearing about the suit. He was very much in favor of making the track admit its accountability, and I was glad there was a decision about how to handle Baby’s death on which we agreed. And while he had never warmed to the idea of my continuing to go back to the track, he must have had something of a change of heart with my CANTER success because one Saturday afternoon in October, we were tailgating at a University of Michigan football game when he noticed that the Channel 7 news team from the local ABC affiliate had a canopy and a tailgating party only about ten car lengths away, and he encouraged me to go over.

  “You know, that’s Robbie Timmons over there,” he said, pointing to the anchorwoman for the five o’clock news broadcast. “Why don’t you tell her about the track closing and all those horses needing homes? Maybe if she did a story on it and it got on TV, you’d have more people interested.”

  I had been talking a lot to magazines and newspapers but hadn’t thought of trying to make contact with television stations.

  “My husband suggested I come over and talk to you,” I said as I approached Robbie. “Are you aware that the Detroit Race Course is closing this year and that many horses there need homes or will go to slaughter? I know this is a bad time to talk about this,” not giving her a chance to shoo me away. “But I could fax you information about the closing and how I am trying to—I have a rescue called CANTER, and I’m trying to find homes for these horses.”

  To my delight, she responded, “That sounds very interesting. Here’s my fax number. Yes, why don’t you fax me some information?”

  Soon enough, I received a call that the station would like to come out to the backstretch to do a story. “I would need you to be there,” Robbie told me. “You’d need to show me exactly what you’re doing. We’d interview some of the trainers, too.”

  After receiving clearance from the track for access to the backstretch and permission to videotape, which I had not been at all certain she’d be granted, she came with an entire news team, and they followed me around, videotaping how I took pictures of the horses outside their stalls, my clipboard in hand to record information. She also did interview various trainers, as she said she would, asking what they were going to do once the track closed. “I don’t know,” they’d answer. “I can’t move out of state, and a lot of these horses are going to need homes.” No one, including me, mentioned slaughter on air. The Racing Commission would have taken away our track licenses unceremoniously, Ladbroke would have barred me from the premises, and the HBPA would have asked me to resign from the board. If, damn it all, I had gone public with what is well known in the industry as “racing’s dirty little secret” about horses going to slaughter, I would have been branded as a crazy lady. It would have been so easy for the track to say, “Her horse died, and she went nuts.”

  Although I struggled with withholding the truth, in the end the decision not to deviate from the script was the only one I could make. To refrain from saying the truth about what happened to discarded horses was the moral choice in this instance. It allowed me to continue saving horses, and that was the bottom line.

  As luck would have it, a woman in one of the sport horse disciplines who happened to be on the backstretch picking out a horse during filming looked directly at the camera and said pointedly, “These horses are running for their lives.” She was free to say what I could not.

  After all the videotaping was complete, Robbie offered to put my name and phone number on the screen for people to contact me should they be interested in buying a horse. I jumped at the opportunity, but she insisted I weigh it. “Are you sure? Because you’re going to get a lot of calls.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m sure.”

  The piece ran two days later, the “running for their lives” comment not edited out, and the phone started ringing before the segment finished airing. “I just saw this thing on TV, and I want to know how I can get a horse. Could you tell—” “Beep beep beeeep.” Call waiting was coming through.

  “Can I put you on hold a minute?” I asked.

  This back-and-forth between phone calls went on, without exaggeration, until midnight, without pause. The callers ran the gamut. There’d be someone on one line who understood horses and had room to board one and someone on the other to whom I had to explain that “these are tall horses, not for children, they don’t know the term ‘whoa’ because they’re taught to run as fast and hard as they can.” One person asked for a spotted horse, although no Thoroughbred racehorse is spotted, while a number of people were so moved by the story that, even though they didn’t know anything about horses, they wanted to buy one and asked where they could board it, understanding that the Thoroughbreds needed to be saved.

  A few hours in, a man called and said, “I was thinking the zoo should have one of these horses.” A nut case, I thought. To my mind, the zoo kept wild animals. For all I knew, the zoo fed horsemeat to its animals.

  “I don’t think that would work,” I said. I was so skeptical that I was almost rude.

  “The zoo has a barnyard exhibit,” the man persisted.

  “Yes, I answered, “but it’s really a petting zoo. I don’t know about a horse for that.”

  “No,” he said. “They really need a horse. Also, could you meet me at the track? I’m going to come with my trailer and my trainer. I want to pick out eight horses.” It was getting weirder by the minute.

  On and on the evening went, with calls ranging from heartening to bizarre, and would have continued past midnight if we didn’t put on the answering machine: “Thank you for your call regarding the horses. Please leave your name and number, and we will get back to you.”

  In the days that followed, some people very savvy about horses contacted me, a number of them willing to take, two, three, even four horses. A woman who ran a horse rescue even said she’d take any horse who had been injured. These knowledgeable horse people were critical to my moving so many horses off the track in a very short time, a particularly lucky break since it was very nearly the end of the season and a glut of horses would end up dumped if not sent to new homes.

  As for the man who called about the zoo, a wealthy developer named Burt Farbman—he turned out to be legitimate. It so happened he was on the Detroit Zoo’s board of directors. He had talked to the zoo director, Ron Kagan, who thought having a horse next to the barnyard exhibit was a wonderful idea, and he was willing to build a two-acre pasture to accommodate it.

  Ron said the horse would have to be quiet and docile because the barnyard workers were not experienced in working with restless animals. Ron also wanted another animal in the pasture, if not a horse than perhaps a goat or a donkey. He knew that horses did not like to be alone.

  I couldn’t find a suitable horse at the track. But a vet north of Detroit who had seen the news segment called me about a Thoroughbred on whom he had just operated. The horse’s racing injuries were so severe that he could never be ridden again. He was being kept at the owner’s farm, unusual in itself because racehorse owners don’t usually save broken down animals.

  The zoo went to see him, a five-year-old gelding named Siberian Sun, and a more sweet and gentle creature you couldn’t find. He lived
comfortably at the Detroit Zoo, always with a pal such as a goat or pony, until dying peacefully more than ten years later. The sign by his pasture read in part, “Rescued Animal. Siberian Sun was particularly hard to place … he was in foster care for quite some time.…Unfortunately, many racehorses are not placed in retirement and are destroyed.”

  Ron, who has been described by Humane Society president Wayne Pacelle as a “rare zoo administrator” who keeps an eye out for animals in need, still serves as zoo director, and Burt did actually take to his farm more than a half dozen horses from the track.

  The newspaper reported that when the horses were first let in the pasture to graze, Burt said they were touching to watch. “They had never been turned out and had never grazed,” he was quoted as saying. “First they were afraid, then they started walking, then they ran and ran.” Having been cooped up in stalls their whole lives, they had to learn how to be horses.

  While good people like Ron and Burt were taking Thoroughbreds who would have otherwise been killed, many people who had seen the TV segment but knew they couldn’t care for a horse sent money for Thoroughbreds to be purchased away from the track—ten dollars, twenty dollars, sometimes less, sometimes more. These were completely selfless acts, with not even a tax write-off to be gained because at that point CANTER was simply an HBPA program, not a nonprofit charity. These viewers so loved animals that they wanted to do something, anything, to help, and they trusted that I would spend their money in the horses’ best interest. It was testament to people’s humanity, and I felt like the warmth of these kindred spirits was so close, a great comfort to me as I worked to link the backstretch to the outside world and in that way change the horses’ fate. Away from the economics of the track, I was heartened to learn, there was a world of like-minded people.

  Robbie herself was one of them. Not long after the news segment aired, she took me to lunch and asked me if all the horses who needed saving had been taken care of, and I told her no, that while I was trying as hard as I could, I wasn’t always successful. Right then and there she pushed a check for $2,500 across the table. “Use it to save more horses,” she said. I was flabbergasted. Her heart was truly in this, right there alongside her professional instinct.

  I used her money, as well as the money sent by others, to help buy horses that I fostered at my own farm until someone else could take them. I had two extra stalls plus a large run-in attached to the barn that could keep another six horses at least for a night or two. Sometimes horses needed someplace to stay short-term until their new owners could make it to the Detroit area. Because I lived so close to the track, I could take them from trainers who wanted to get rid of them as quickly as possible, not wanting to wait a day or two. Other times, I bought a horse outright without another buyer waiting in the wings, knowing I could figure a way to have it adopted once it was safe at my house.

  Come November, with the season almost officially over and many horses having come from the track through my property and also to many other people’s, the HBPA board decided to put on an auction of its own to help get rid of horses that nobody had bought through CANTER but that needed to be disposed of. Trainers and curiosity seekers would be there, as would kill buyers. I also knew that some of the people I had come in contact with as a result of the news segment would be present—people with room to spare in their barns and, we hoped, enough money to outbid those who wanted to buy horses for slaughter.

  Not many days before the auction, during the last week or so of racing, I was walking down one of the backstretch roadways, still looking over possible horses to sell to people in sporting disciplines, when I could hear somebody calling out to me, running to catch up. “Thoroughbred Lady! Thoroughbred Lady!” It was a groom.

  He was extremely anxious that a horse he had cared for over a long period and who had made $188,000 in races was injured but still at the track. “I know he can’t win anymore,” he said, “and I know that when this is over, his trainer won’t let him go anywhere but in the auction. Would you please bid for him? His name is Don Pilafidis.”

  “Don’t worry,” I told him. “I’ll be at the auction and make sure he goes to a safe place.”

  I knew it couldn’t be me who did the bidding. With my reputation as a bleeding heart, some of the kill buyers would bid me up just to make it difficult for me to get the horse. It wouldn’t be the first time my efforts would be thwarted. The culture at the track was such that I was mocked by many for trying to save horses, and sometimes, to taunt me, owners and trainers sold a horse to a meat buyer rather than to someone I found who was willing to pay just as much money for the very same horse. With that in mind, I asked one of the rescuers with whom I had become acquainted to make the bids, and she obliged. A number of us had pooled money, including some of the money sent to me by TV viewers, to save the horse from slaughter, so we were hopeful we’d be successful.

  The poor horses that were led into the auction ring—their having no clue about what might happen to them made the sight all the more pitiful. They trusted the people around them, having done their bidding for years by running in rain, snow, and ninety-degree weather with fractured bones and torn tendons, injected with medications and standing submissively in ice buckets to reduce swelling. They had no idea they were now for sale and that few who took care of them cared about where they would end up.

  The bidding for Don Pilafidis started at $200. My person nodded yes, and then a couple standing with one of the kill buyers and who I assumed were acting as a front for him upped the amount. I signaled our bidder to go higher, and it kept going back and forth, with the price rising higher and higher. We were already at $800, $900, now having exceeded the highest price the kill buyer would fetch for the horse as meat.

  Shane Spiess could see I was trying to outbid the couple from the sidelines and came over. “Jo Anne, you don’t have to worry,” he said. “That couple really wants the horse. They’ve been following him. They’ll keep it at a beautiful stable.”

  “Shane,” I answered, “if we back off and what you’re saying is not true, I don’t even want to think about what I’m going to do to you.”

  “Trust me,” he replied. “Let them take the horse.”

  I did, and the couple, young and well heeled, did in fact board Don Pilafidis at a beautiful farm. They thought he had the look of eagles, of a class horse, and had no intention of putting him through anything rigorous.

  Don Pilafidis was tall, with a regal bearing, yet so gentle in his stall. When he was turned out, however, he tore around. He rolled from one side to the other, got up, shook, and ran around some more. Freedom!

  I never ceased to be amazed at what could happen at the track. While so many trainers blithely sent their horses to slaughter, and kill buyers couldn’t have cared less about what happened to “used up” Thoroughbreds, here was Shane, who often made money off kill buyers, assuring me that Don Pilafidis would be okay and that I didn’t have to spend any money to make sure of it. And there was that young couple fraternizing with a kill buyer himself. It didn’t make sense, and yet it happened.

  Larry Wales, the track vet, stepped up to the plate, too, stopping me one day to tell me he had a horse that broke down the previous evening and wasn’t going to race again. “They’re willing to give it away,” he told me. “You don’t have to buy it.” Again, a trainer was putting his humanity above his wallet.

  The horse, a filly named Shobonier, didn’t load onto the trailer easily. The poor thing was terrified. But Larry sedated her, and off she went to the barn of one of my new contacts. She changed hands many times since then, having done dressage and low-level hunter-jumper competitions. Today, almost fifteen years later, she lives a comfortable life at the farm of one of the very first people I met as a result of the television segment.

  Soon after the Shobonier save, ABC News ran a follow-up piece. It aired on Thanksgiving, and the viewers were told that all the horses found homes, giving the story a happy ending. But it was not true. A n
umber of horses were forced to limp onto trailers either to race elsewhere or be transported to auction pens, after which they’d end their days on bloodied slaughterhouse floors.

  Worse still, even with the track closing, the plight of the Thoroughbreds wasn’t going to be over. News had broken on the backstretch that a new track was going to open somewhere else in the state. Where hadn’t been decided yet.

  Just as word of a new track was buzzing, the date for the annual awards dinner in eventing rolled around again. I knew Scarlett wasn’t going to win in her category this year—the competition was going to be much stiffer at this level, and she was still relatively new to the sport—but I looked forward to the banquet nonetheless. It was a great way to socialize with people in eventing who, like me, loved their horses; a great way to see them without their “helmet hair.” I brought Baby in my own way, too.

  In Michigan, with the Eventing Association’s permission, people in the sport are allowed to award trophies in a person or horse’s honor. I decided to create the Reel Surprise Memorial Trophy, to be given to the ex-racehorse who achieved the most points that year.

  “My family believes it was our privilege to have been loved by Reel Surprise and to have been at his side at the moment of his birth and until his last breath,” I told the audience when making the presentation. “There was a song sung by Carly Simon that was popular soon after he was born. It contained the words:

  From the moment I first saw you

  The second that you were born

  I knew that you were the love of my life

  Quite simply, the love of my life.

  “We heard that song so frequently in the barn when he was a baby,” I went on, “that we started referring to it as Reel Surprise’s song. If you read the engraving on the trophy, you will see that we have quoted from it, with a slight change to make the wording plural. It reads, “‘Quite simply, the love of our lives.’”