\u201cGood morning yesterday. You wake up and time has slipped away. And suddenly it\u2019s hard to find the memories you left behind. Remember. Do you remember?\u201d \u2014 Paul Anka<\/p>\n
No racing at Aqueduct on Monday. Or ever again. Born Sept. 27, 1894, the racetrack in South Ozone Park, Queens, will run its last horse race Sunday.<\/p>\n
Not many race fans will be reaching for the Kleenex box when the thoroughbreds load the starting gate for the ultimate nightcap. OK, maybe after the race if their 32-1 shot loses by a nose. But for some, like this aging handicapper, it will mark the end of a lifetime of memories.<\/p>\n
If you asked 100 fans what their favorite racetrack is, you may hear two or three tell you Aqueduct. And you would look at them as if they hadn\u2019t quite heard the question. Saratoga is grand hats. Aqueduct is backward baseball caps worn by fans trying to figure out if the speed will hold in the late double.<\/p>\n
Santa Anita\u2019s backdrop? The scenic San Gabriel Mountains. The Big A? Mounds of dirt left by construction crews. Churchill Downs? Mint juleps. Aqueduct? Beer. Cold if you wait until Race 3. Gulfstream Park has flamingos. Railbirds rule at the Big A.<\/p>\n
Three things you can count on: death, taxes and three or four maiden claiming races on every card. But Aqueduct is where Secretariat made his career debut \u2014 a loss on July 4, 1972. It\u2019s where Seattle Slew won the Wood Memorial before going on to win the Triple Crown. It\u2019s where Pope John Paul II prayed for peace. And where Tony Soprano and his gang prayed for Pie-O-My to win.<\/p>\n
Triple Crown winner Secretariat, with his usual jockey Ron Turcotte aboard, struts past the grandstand at Aqueduct Racetrack in New York, Nov. 6, 1973. AP<\/p>\n
I was born in Brooklyn, raised in Queens \u2014 115th Street between Rockaway Boulevard and Sutter Avenue. A furlong from Aqueduct. From our attic, with the help of a pair of binoculars, you could see a part of the main track. From the street, you could hear the crowd roar. We imagined \u2014 no, knew \u2014 it was for us as we played Wiffle ball in the yard.<\/p>\n
Watch the races on Fox Sports? That school you see in the distance? It\u2019s P.S. 100, where I learned to read. That church? O.L.P.H., where I learned to confess. Pan back a bit more. That\u2019s Sofia\u2019s Pizza, formerly the Guys of Vinegar Hill Tavern, where I learned not to mix vodka with rum. We played roller hockey in the parking lot near 114th Street until Big A security chased us. We walked to John Adams High School carrying textbooks and a racing form.<\/p>\n
When old enough \u2014 well, almost old enough to wager \u2014 I would meet my dad, uncles and cousins at the 1\/16th pole, first floor. A family affair. The memories are forever and priceless.<\/p>\n
The MTA\u2019s Aqueduct Special nostalgia train operated with historic R1\/9 subway cars preserved by the New York Transit Museum. Matt Roberts\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
I watched my Uncle George bet $500 on the mighty Forego. (Aunt Mary still doesn\u2019t know about that one.) Watched my Uncle Dan run the length of the stretch yelling at Darby Creek Road to get up in the 1978 Wood. They both finished second behind Believe It.<\/p>\n
Aqueduct could have been renamed Transylvania Downs when the thick fog set in. When they crossed the wire, my cousin John and I stared at each other, with no clue if we won, lost or if our horse even ran. If one of us hit big, we would make our way over to Don Peppe\u2019s, an Italian restaurant off Lefferts Boulevard that Tony Soprano would have frequented. If not, we would convince each other, \u201cWe\u2019ll get them tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parka-wearing assistant starters(top) oversee horses breaking from the starting gate for the third race at Aqueduct Race Track on January 31, 2007. Albany Times Union via Getty Ima<\/p>\n
We had racing legends in our backyard. Riders like Angel Cordero Jr., Jorge Velazquez and Eddie Maple. I remember that winter when it seemed Steve Cauthen won five or six races a day. And how dozens of angry fans booed a jockey (unheard of today) if they thought they didn\u2019t get a fair ride. Trainers like Allen \u201cThe Chief\u201d Jerkens and Frank \u201cPancho\u201d Martin.<\/p>\n
We heard race calls from men blessed with golden pipes. Marshall Cassidy, Chic Anderson, John Imbriale and Dave \u201cDown the stretch they come\u201d Johnson. Later, Tom Durkin brought his story-telling style.<\/p>\n
We listened as Harvey Pack laid out his betting strategy for the Early Pick Three on the closed-circuit monitor. When we couldn\u2019t get there, Pack, Frank Wright and Charlsie Cantey were there and we tuned in on Saturday evenings to watch the feature and the finale on Channel 9. But only if the antenna was properly placed. We considered selections from newspaper handicappers like John Piesen, Rick Lang, John Pricci and Russ Harris.<\/p>\n
Braulio Baeza in action aboard Buckpasser (3) during race at Aqueduct Racetrack. Sports Illustrated via Getty Images<\/p>\n
It was a golden age for horse racing. And we soaked it in.<\/p>\n
Things change. There are a couple of hundred fans at the Big A now. There were a couple of hundred people who didn\u2019t get a seat there in the \u201960s, \u201970s and early \u201980s. It was special. Exciting. Fun. Our neighborhood loved Aqueduct like the Springs loves Saratoga.<\/p>\n
So as the sun sets for the last time behind the tote board and the majority happily say \u201cgood riddance,\u201d we say, \u201cThank you, Aqueduct,\u201d for all the memories. Hope you hit the last race Sunday.<\/p>\n
But if you don\u2019t \u2026 we\u2019ll get them tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cGood morning yesterday. You wake up and time has slipped away. And suddenly it\u2019s hard to find the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":280031,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[28060,28059,57,9,24,63,122,124,123,319],"class_list":["post-280030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-aqueduct","tag-horse-racing","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}