The cream that rose to the top
by Lisa Harkema
A very good trotter and world champion, he was initially deemed not good to stand stud at Hanover Shoe Farms and sold to Europe. When his Italian buy failed to pay, Star’s Pride was given a small opportunity at stud at the famed nursey. Despite the lack of confidence and not being given the best mares, the colt immdiately showed himself as a spectacular stallion – maybe the best in history.
Sep Palin trained Greyhound while Jimmy Wingfield groomed him. In 1948 they were at the yearling auction in Indianapolis; Palin was running the sale and Wingfield was there as a buyer. When the latter kept bidding on a Worthy Boy yearling colt, only to face breeder Harry Warwick, who kept bidding up the price of his own product, Palin saw Wingfield have the highest bid at $2,950 and told Warwick, “Let the boy have the colt, he’ll do alright with him” to which Warwick actually agreed and stopped bidding to push up the price. Thus one of the most legendary horses of all times got sold relatively cheaply.
Neither Palin nor Warwick knew, however, that Wingfield was just proxy bidding for another trainer, Harry Pownall, who in turn was acting for E Roland Harriman’s Arden Homestead – who would later sell half of the horse in question, Star’s Pride, to Lawrence Sheppard of Hanover Shoe Farm. Later Warwick admitted being very upset when he learned this, thinking he could probably have forced the price higher given that the buyer wasn’t exactly short of cash. In reality, though, Wingfield had only been authorized to go to $2,500, although Pownall had added that “don’t let a couple houndred stop you,” something which Wingfield interpreted rather liberally. The coincidences didn’t stop there, though. Pownall had come to the auction to buy fillies and when his old friend Sam Berger, who worked for Warwick, suggested he take a look at Star’s Pride he did so more out of courtesy than a genuine interest in the colt – until he saw him, that was. Pownall found Star’s Pride to be a very nice yearling and was instantly attracted to him. Since he couldn’t be there for the whole auction he asked Wingfield to bid on Star’s Pride for him. When Pownall heard that Wingfield had gone over the limit by more than a couple hundred he was not too happy, but fortunately Harriman had no problems ok’ing the purchase.