Bernard P. "Bernie" Bond, Maryland's most active "halterman" during the 1950s and 1960s, and three times Maryland's top trainer with his claiming stable, saw the numbers decrease as he got older -- from more than 60 horses down to a baker's dozen in 1975 (eight of which were 2-year-olds). But the quality was way up.
Stakes-winning siblings Gala Double and Gala Lil, by Spring Double out of Right as Rain, by *Rasper II, bred by Glade Valley Farms, were the headliners. The "gala" runners raced for Bond's principal owner Gertrude Leviton, whose husband, Leonard, was an Atlantic City beer distributor.
"They're the best owners a man could have," said the 58-year-old trainer. "They never bug me, never tell me where to run. It's almost like I own the horses myself." The Levitons had a top 2-year-old prospect, an unnamed colt by Silent Screen out of Martinetta, the dam of Rollicking, also purchased from Glade Valley. "I don't even know if he can run," said Bond. "Never done any more than gallop him. But I'll say this for him -- he's the handsomest damn horse I've ever had in my barn."
The Silent Screen colt was Gala Harry. While he didn't win in two starts at 2, he eventually won 13 races, three stakes, and placed in five other stakes while earning $172,518. The Levitons stayed with Bond until he retired in 1993, just weeks before his death, and left their horses, including multiple stakes winner Gala Spinaway, in the barn of Bond's young assistant, Graham Motion.
Chick Lang, Pimlico's 49-year-old general manager, was the son of Charles "Chick" Lang, who rode Reigh Count to win the 1928 Kentucky Derby. His maternal grandfather, John P. Mayberry, trained Judge Himes to win the 1903 Derby. "So," said Lang, "you can see from my pedigree that I've got Kentucky Derby top and bottom." Lang sat down with Snowden Carter to talk about how a high-school dropout became Pimlico's top executive, how he quit the business for a time early in his career after being a jock's agent to become a car salesman, until he was offered the book for a young rider named Bill Hartack.
"All of a sudden I was a successful man," said Lang. "Believe me, it wasn't being smart. It was being in the right place at the right time. In a word, I got lucky."
Brandywine Stable, whose runners -- the likes of Greek Money, Cochise and Open Fire -- carried the familiar blue and gold silks around most of the major tracks in America, was under the management of Donnie Ross Jr. following the death of his father Donald Ross, who founded the stable adjacent to Delaware Park in the 1930s.
"The guiding hands of Brandywine Stable today -- Donnie Ross and his trainer Joe Clancy -- were both born and raised on the same farm, just a few miles up Limestone Road from Delaware Park -- the farm which Clancy's father managed for Donnie's father for more than 40 years."
