The release of the movie "Secretariat" on Friday recalls a dark time 37 years ago when a great race horse lifted the spirits of the nation.
Actress Diane Lane (left) portrays Penny Chenery (right), who was the owner of Secretariat when "Big Red" won the Triple Crown in 1973.CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Secretariat was a thing of beauty in an ugly time. That is one reason why his name will last forever.
His records might too. That is another reason.
"Big Red" was his nickname. He had a glossy chestnut coat, and three of his legs were marked with white "stockings." For five weeks, spanning the Triple Crown races in 1973, he showed Americans what greatness looked like, while showing the world that it could still be born and bred here.
In the spring of 1973, American troops had finally left Vietnam. Two years later, helicopters would be rescuing Americans from the roof of the embassy when Saigon fell.
The Watergate hearings were on television during the spring and summer in 1973.
In the fall, the OPEC oil embargo began, in retribution for American aid to Israel during the Yom Kipper War. Motorists waited in long lines on odd or even days, determined by the final number on their license plate, to buy gas -- when there was any.
Secretariat wins the Kentucky Derby
"Secretariat showed that we could export something that was beautiful and exciting and guileless in the time of Watergate and the war we were involved in," said Diane Lane, who plays the horse's owner Penny Chenery Tweedy in the Disney movie "Secretariat," which opens Friday.
The last movie about a horse that was a big hit was "Seabiscuit," who was an underdog and raced during the Great Depression. Ordinary people identified with him. Now the country is going through hard times again. It might take the last century's super horse to carry many of us to the finish line.
Penny Chenery's role is the underdog every Hollywood sports movie has to have. She assumed control of Meadow Farm Stables, a housewife in a male-dominated world, upon her father's death and set the course that resulted in racing's first Triple Crown winner in 25 years.
Lane herself is a horsewoman. She did not ride in "Secretariat," however. "Not on those rockets [thoroughbreds]," she said in a national teleconference. "But I have ridden before on film, usually in a Western saddle, which requires a corset."
Secretariat still holds the record for the fastest time in the Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes. He should share the Preakness record, but the official clock almost surely malfunctioned during the race.
People beyond the racing world loved him, not only because of his amazing blend of speed and endurance, but because of his personality. He was a showman.
Secretariat storms through the field to win the Preakness
"It was important when he was at stud [after his Triple Crown season] that he was at a farm where people could see him," Chenery said of Kentucky's Claiborne Farm. "He loved attention. He would come out and strut around."
The Belmont, the final Triple Crown race, made Secretariat an American folk hero with his smashing victory by 31 lengths in the daunting 1 1/2-mile test. Sham, second by 2 1/2 lengths in both the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, simply gave up when Secretariat made the greatest move in Triple Crown history on the backstretch.
"Sham was a great horse in his own right," said Secretariat's jockey Ron Turcotte in a national conference call. "Any other year, he might have won the Triple Crown. By the Belmont, he had chased Secretariat so long, it had taken it out of him. He was washed out."
"Secretariat put wings on, like Pegasus, at the Belmont and expressed all the joy of running," said Lane.
Turcotte is played in the movie by a real jockey, Otto Thorwarth. The film's camera angles include footage from a tiny camera mounted on the jockey's cap. "You can press the thumbnail-sized YouTube icon and watch that race, but you practically have dirt in your teeth after watching this movie," said Lane.
Asked what it felt and sounded like in the Belmont home stretch, Turcotte said, "All I could hear was the clippety-clop of my own horse, but I peeked at the crowd."
Secretariat "like a tremendous machine" routs the Belmont Stakes
He saw thousands of hands clapping, as the mass of spectators rose to their feet. "You know how it is when you see rough seas, with white caps? That's how it looked," he said.
Horse racing was much healthier in 1973 in this country than it is now. But Turcotte said he wouldn't count on another Secretariat coming along as a savior. The great horse was euthanized at age 19 in 1989 after he was afflicted with a painful hoof disease.
"Secretariat set records that still stand today. He could run on any surface, in the mud and slop, on soft turf, hard turf, deep turf," the jockey said. "It was like God decided to make the perfect horse."