Staff Writer

For 60 years, the call to the post has drawn race fans, horse owners, trainers and riders to Scarborough Downs.

As the track prepares for its anniversary celebration on Saturday, July 17, Director of Marketing Susan Higgins hopes more families will embrace the fun and action she has come to love.

“It has its own set of smells and sounds,” Higgins said. “We are hoping people who have not been to the track will come out.”

Anniversary celebration plans include a buffet supper at the Downs Club restaurant, a video of Hotrod Falcon’s track record-setting race win in 1993, vintage harness racing memorabilia and artifacts, displays about Hall of Fame harness racing drivers and T-shirt giveaways.

Track officials are using the occasion to reflect on times when a day at the races held far more popular appeal and to remind people there are few things that combine nostalgia and excitement like a horse race.

When the track opened on July 1, 1950, it featured Thoroughbred horseback racing. Since 1968, the track has featured Standardbred racing with pacers or trotters pulling drivers on carts called sulkies.

“Our identity is as a harness racing track,” Higgins said.

Built on 500 acres, Scarborough Downs originally featured a one-mile track. Harness drivers now race twice around a half-mile track. Racing fan Don Isaacs said the shorter track enhances the viewing experience.

“You can see where your horse is the whole time – you don’t need binoculars.”

Isaacs, a Baldwin resident who owned harness horses for 10 or 15 years, said they were less expensive to buy than Thoroughbreds. Because Standardbreds can race as often as once a week up to age 14, Isaacs said it gave him a chance to enjoy his investments more.

Isaac is no longer an owner, but said he still loves to handicap races and watch the horses run.

“Where else can you go to spend the afternoon and talk to nice people and leave maybe $100 up? Or you may leave $50 down, but that is what you might spend on dinner out anyway,” Isaacs said.

As Scarborough Downs strives to reach a new audience, Higgins also is compiling favorite memories from longtime customers to show as part of the anniversary celebration.

She shared a letter from Portland resident Richard Libby, who said he was 10 years old when he attended the first day of racing at the track on July 1, 1950.

“I remember how fast they’d come out of that gate. Never saw anything like that before,” writes Libby.

Libby’s recollections match Higgins’ aspirations for Scarborough Downs.

“In those days the Downs was a family outing place. We never went there without meeting other people that we knew. People were quite sociable and everybody seemed to like to talk about horses, even to strangers,” Libby writes.

On a Friday afternoon last month, Buxton resident Phil Cummings brought his daughter, Crystal Logan, and his granddaughter, Maggie Redmond, out to the races to learn why he enjoys them.

“It doesn’t matter if you bet or not,” Cummings said. “You can just plain relax and enjoy the horses.”

Events at Scarborough Downs have sometimes played out over bumpy tracks. In the history Higgins compiled, she noted initial owners Fred Snow and Robert Verrier built the track and grandstand in 75 days on land bought from the town for $600.

Within a year, the men found themselves in court with Gorham Raceway owner Joseph Cianchette in a dispute over competing race dates. The court ruled harness and Thoroughbred races could not be run on the same days, Higgins wrote.

The track enjoyed its most profitable year in 1959, when Higgins said an estimated 260,000 fans attended races and bet more than $65 million in today’s dollars.

By 1979, Scarborough Downs endured harder times when businessman Joseph Ricci bought the track for $990,000, Higgins said. A fire in 180 burned three barns and one in 1984 destroyed the clubhouse, which was later rebuilt. Ricci owned and operated the track until his death in 2001, when it passed to his widow, Sharon Terry, the current owner.

Out by the paddock, where drivers and horses converge before races, driver Ron Cushing said he has been racing for 29 years, continuing a tradition started by his father and uncle in Farmington.

“It is a sport – very competitive, and there are a lot of good horses racing here,” Cushing said.

Shawn Gray, based in West Gardiner, said he has been driving for 17 years and continues because he loves the horses.

Cushing and Gray are the top winning drivers at the track this season, and are known as “catch drivers” because they may race eight times in a 10-race day at the track.

Races are split between trotters and pacers, which describe the gait horses use when racing. Pacers race with front and hind legs on one side moving in unison. When trotters race, the diagonal front and hind legs move in unison. Both gaits are learned through training.

Race fields are set as much as a month in advance by track judges and officials. Fields are set by horses’ ages, gender and race records, and owners then enter their horses. Field qualifications may vary between genders for a particular race but are set to create an even competition.

Horses must be entered no later than four days before a race, according to “condition sheets” track officials prepare in advance of racing cards.

Scarborough Downs offers racing dates from April through December, with a break taken in early autumn for racing at agricultural fairs, including Cumberland and Fryeburg fairs.

In races held June 25, purses ranged from $2,500 to $8,000 for 10 races. Higgins and horse owner Mark Harris of Scarborough said the purses are split through the first five finishers in a race and the winner gets 50 percent. Trainers generally earn 10 percent of any purse awarded and drivers may get 5 percent, Higgins said.

Races now are limited to daylight at Scarborough Downs because light poles were removed along with a barrier that separated the polls from the track. Cushing said he enjoys the day racing and has seen it work at other tracks in New Jersey.

With free admission and parking, Higgins said the track’s strategy is to create a new set of fans to enjoy the family-owned businesses of breeding, training and racing Standardbred horses.

Making Scarborough Downs an enticing place to visit after a day at the beach is one approach. Emphasizing nearby live action to target a younger crowd that enjoys online gaming is another strategy to be pursued, Higgins said.

Cushing said drivers, trainers and owners have enjoyed increased purses and funding for breeding because of revenue from slot machines at a Hollywood Slots near the Bangor Raceway.

“We had been doing the same thing for less,” he said.

While fortunes have improved locally, Cushing said racing purses also have improved more substantially in places such as Yonkers Raceway in New York. He attributed the increases to slot machine revenue combined with better track promotion.

While Scarborough Downs enjoys a portion of the revenue from Bangor, its backers would like to install the slot machines that generate profits.

Scarborough voters have twice rejected referendum questions that would begin the process of allowing slot machines at the track, and Higgins said Sharon Terry has spoken with officials from other area towns about possibly relocating the track.

The need for increased revenue may ultimately trump the track’s traditional link to Scarborough, Higgins said.

“Sharon wants to stay here. This is our home. But we need our slot revenues,” Higgins said.

Staff writer David Harry can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 219