“Look at me, look at me, look at me now!”  The small filly’s feet thrummed the cadence into the dirt at Historic Track on July 4, 2004.  A fast and pure square trotter, her legs piston fired in perfect rhythm counting down the strides, One Two Three Four.  I stood with nose stretched over the rail, smelling horse, hearing power, and viewing beauty.  It was my first visit to Goshen, New York and I was hooked. 

The area bulges with tree strewn hills, stone fences, green meadows, and white fenced pastures full of deer and horses grazing aside each other in amicable silence.  New babies on stuttering legs chase butterflies through the sunlit terrain.  Tall raftered red barns with attached granaries sprout new mown hay through open hatches. 

Goshen exudes history.  A renowned English Thoroughbred, Imported Messenger, first established Goshen as the Cradle of the Trotter, back in 1801.  The offspring he produced moved with a new gait, a long, slinging step at the walk which, when accelerated, produced the trotting gait of the filly tossing her head in delight on the track in front of me.

For over 175 years, Goshen has played host to the greats of harness racing.  Founded in 1838, Historic Track, the first sporting site to be declared a registered National Historic Landmark, is still the place to view some of the sport's finest trotters and pacers display their speed and grace.  No other weekend is as full of notables as the annual Fourth of July Hall of Fame event.  A Tudor style mansion and stable house the Harness Racing Museum & Hall of Fame next to Historic Track.

The Museum is a living shrine to the great men, women, and horses of the sport and is eagerly visited by the international harness racing world.  In the Harness Writers' Hall of Fame historic drivers, owners, and horses are immortalized in lifelike poses.  The Art Gallery houses the world’s definitive collection of Currier & Ives trotting prints plus paintings by the prominent equine artists of the 19th Century.  Artfully enthroned throughout this wonderful place, exhibits and displays leave the viewer convinced of the importance harness horses are to America’s past, present, and future.  On view are the sulkies and colors of champions, harness racing art, and gems such as Dan Patch’s halter.  Captured by the sights and scenes, I catapulted from room to room until the sounds of the track drew me back outside to wander the backtrack

Harness Racing is a democratic sport; owner-drivers with two horses compete equally with multi-million dollar stables.  Not much has changed since the milkman hooked his horse to a light buggy on Sunday to challenge the rich man’s high perch phaeton on the backcountry lanes.  Respect and honors revolve around one’s driving ability and horse, rather then the thread count of racing silks.  In fact, drivers wear their own colors; rather then those of the hiring stable and the crowd chants the color combinations of favorites as the sulkies came down the track. 

On one race, as the horses jogged up to the mobile starter gate, the outside draw horse reached out with his nose and poked at it, willing the gate to fall back so he could release his pent up desire to move ahead.  As the other horses fell into position, the poking became incessant.  The gate folded back, and the horse, sulky, and driver blurred into a driving force racing without cover the entire mile.  As he entered the final lap, I saw him look over to me, and wink.  He knew the day was his, the race was won, and he was lord of the wind.   Trotting back to the grandstand, his knees pointed skyward and his eyes shone.  Not one of the excited race goers had enjoyed that race nearly as much as he had.  He pranced in place, his perfect form unconsciously displaying the harmony, beauty and power inherent in the performance techniques made famous by the Baroque cavalry and refined into the Haute Ecole school of dressage.  Dressage masters search for years to find a horse with a tenth of the potential this Standardbred was born with. 

Unique horses demand extraordinary people to appreciate them.  The Standardbred community richly deserves the horses it treasures.  Eyes shone as the wonder of horse absorbed into the crowd, spilling forth in frothy soft murmurs and louder chants of encouragement and joy as the track reverberated to the sound of hooves.  Proud owners, trainers, drivers, and spectators poured forth praise laving the pricked ears of the horses with the sounds of approbation they live for.   Sensitive to praise, Standardbreds live to please, and can pace their way into the heart as easily as they do into the record books.  Standardbred people know and treasure this facet of the breed, handling them with gentle appreciation and deep respect.

I was touched by the difference between this breed’s custodians and those of other disciplines.  The horse’s fate after the race is run rivals importance with their care during racing times.  Owner after owner spoke about their concern for their horses.  They gladly shared what their industry was doing to re-home Standardbreds, the united effort to keep them safe from slaughter.  One (a personal hero of mine) spoke with deep conviction on his belief there is no such thing as an unwanted Standardbred, only Standardbreds that still needed to find their forever places.  A small muscle animated his jaw as he vowed that no more Standardbreds would be found in the kill pens, fodder for rich, voracious foreign appetites.

Several Standardbreds currently reside at my equine sanctuary, sent there by this hero.  One is training for a youth intervention program, destined to teach trust to abused children.  Another will apply his infinite patience to carrying disabled people safely into a world they can now explore from atop his willing back.  A third has mended the hole in the heart of my husband that gaped painfully open after his long-time companion mare passed away.  A gentle gelding that rode the truck down with them guards a small group of weak, elderly horses that came here to spend their last days in green meadows and cool shade.  He embodies the heart of the breed; loyal and loving, his self-chosen job is to be a caretaker.  He encourages a few of the weak to eat, and grooms the arthritic shoulders of others.

The three days at Goshen flew, leaving me energized and hopeful for the breed and its humans.  Their ancient concordance of caring has been reenacted here.  As I prepared to leave Goshen and head home, I took one last look at the athletes on the track and smiled.  Historic Track and its horses and people have entered my heart and marked me for life.