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The moving story of a tough little horse, a gifted boy, and a
woman ahead of her time.
The youngest jockey, the smallest horse, and an unconventional
heiress who disliked publicizing herself. Together, near Liverpool,
England, they made a leap of faith on a spring day in 1938:
overriding the jockey's father, trusting the boy and the horse that
the British nicknamed "the American pony" to handle a race course
that newspapers called Suicide Lane. There, Battleship might become
the first American racer to win England's monumental, century-old
Grand National steeplechase. His rider, Great Britain's Bruce
Hobbs, was only seventeen years old.
Hobbs started life with an advantage: his father, Reginald, was a
superb professional horseman. But Reg Hobbs also made extreme
demands, putting Bruce in situations that horrified the boy's
mother and sometimes terrified the child. Bruce had to decide just
how brave he could stand to be.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the enigmatic Marion duPont grew
up at the estate now known as James Madison's Montpelier--the
refuge of America's "Father of the Constitution." Rejecting her
chance to be a debutante, denied a corporate role because of her
gender, Marion chose a pursuit where horses spoke for her. Taking
on the world's toughest race, she would leave her film-star
husband, Randolph Scott, a continent away and be pulled beyond her
own control. With its reach from Lindbergh's transatlantic flight
to Cary Grant's Hollywood, "Battleship" is an epic tale of personal
drive to test one's own true worth.
His trainer said that managing him was like holding a tiger by the
tail. His owner compared him to "chain lightning." His jockeys
found their lives transformed by him, in triumphant and distressing
ways. All of them became caught in a battle for honesty.
Born in 1917, Man o' War grew from a rebellious youngster into
perhaps the greatest racehorse of all time. He set such astonishing
speed records that" The New York Times "called him a "Speed
Miracle." Often he won with so much energy in reserve that experts
wondered how much faster he could have gone. Over the years, this
and other mysteries would envelop the great Man o' War.
The truth remained problematic. Even as Man o' War---known as "Big
Red"---came to power, attracting record crowds and rave publicity,
the colorful sport of Thoroughbred racing struggled for integrity.
His lone defeat, suffered a few weeks before gamblers fixed the
1919 World Series, spawned lasting rumors that he, too, had been
the victim of a fix.
Tackling old beliefs with newly uncovered evidence," Man o' War: A
Legend Like Lightning "shows how human pressures collided with a
natural phenomenon and brings new life to an American icon. The
genuine courage of Man o' War, tribulations of his archrival, Sir
Barton (America's first Triple Crown winner), and temptations of
their Hall of Fame jockeys and trainers reveal a long-hidden tale
of grace, disgrace, and elusive redemption.
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