Phar Lap Author:Helen Townsend, David Williamson The story of Phar Lap is more than the story of just a great racehorse, it's a rags-to-riches thriller about a horse that in a sense embodied the soul of Australia during the Great Depression. Phar Lap was a freak. He was the battlers' horse, saved from the slaughterhouse by an impoverished trainer with fanatical bloodline theories, who ... more »turned out to be one of the greatest racehorses the world has ever seen.
His unerring ability to defeat the best thoroughbreds of the time with such ease and grace endeared him to the depressed workers and the unemployed. But hat same ability rocked the foundations of the racing establishment. The wealthy owners, bookmakers and racketeers drove him from Australia to America where he competed in the richest race in the world, and where he died in agony, cradled in the arms of his dedicated strapped.
Phar Lap was so loved that his death plunged the nation into mourning. Flags were flown at half mast in Australia and newspapers in America ran his obituary on black-bordered front pages.« less