The anniversary will be celebrated during the weekend of the club’s race meeting on Sunday, November 24, at Ascot Park in Invercargill.
The Winton Jockey Club is the oldest standing racing club in Southland, with its first recorded race meeting in 1875.
The pioneers of the district cleared flax and scrub from a swampy 215 acres of land set aside by the government to form a racecourse reserve.
Over the coming decades, the rich river-bed land, with the help of the Hazlett drain-plough, provided the fastest mile grass track in the South Island.
Central Southland’s lush green paddocks and fertile soils were also ideal conditions for breeding race horses.
Over the years there have been many excellent horses, trainers, jockeys, owners, breeders and administrators from the district.
Prominent owners and breeders in the district have included Tom Oliver, who bred and raced the great mare, Excellency. A 2-year-old Stakes race at Winton and the New Zealand Cup in 1949 were two of her 16 wins.
The Deegan Brothers imported the stallions, Kurdistan and Callander. These two sires exerted a wide influence on the thoroughbred in Southland from the 1950s.
The Swale family have also been prominent horse owners and breeders.
William Swale jun bred Royal Lancer, the best horse of his time. Among his many successes were the 1942 New Zealand Cup and the Winton Cup in 1946.
Jockeys Tod Hewitt, Bren Langford and Neil Ridley were each as good as any in their respective eras.
Langford won 345 races on the flat, and over the hurdles and steeplechases. He also won trotting races and saddle trots. Winning the 1963 Grand National Steeplechase on No Offence was the fulfilment of his greatest ambition.
Ridley was a leading jumps jockey from 1970 to 1994. He had multiple wins in the Grand National Hurdles and the Grand National Steeplechase on the three southern stars, Bymai, Lord Venture and the horse the Queen Mother later raced, Nearco Bay. He also won a national strike-rate title as trainer in 2000/01.
Near the end of the 19th century, Tod Hewitt arrived at Heddon Bush, northwest of Winton, to work a farm.
The owner, John Tennant, taught him to ride, and gave him his first race-day ride on Sparrow in the Winton Guineas, which he won.
Hewitt went on to become one of New Zealand's greatest horsemen and later an outstanding rider in Europe. Among the big owners he rode for in Australia, France, England, Germany and India, were emperors, princes and numerous millionaires.
He won the 1913 1000 Guineas in England and set records for winning rides at the New Zealand Cup, Auckland and Sydney carnivals. At Riccarton he won 14 races at one Cup meeting, and almost equalled that record at Ellerslie, when he rode 12 winners at an Auckland Cup meeting.
The Winton JC holds just one race meeting each year in spring. In previous years the club has held the age group classic races, trotting races and steeplechases. However, the Winton Cup is the only feature race to stand the test of time.
Former jockey and current Winton trainer John Phillips has been on the committee for 40 years. Phillips trained Jack Daniels to win the Cup in 1997 and King Prawn in 2013.
Fellow Winton trainers Sophie Price and Leda Beck have also trained Cup winners; Beck won the last Cup to be held on the Winton race track in 2018 with Gold'n Guru, while Price prepared Silent Battler to win in 2021.
The Winton JC committee contains many of the names noted in earlier years of the club's history. Many members are descendants of men who have served in past years.
Ralph Swale, of Centre Bush, was the first president of the Winton Jockey Club in 1875. Ralph’s son William was president in his time on the committee from 1901 through to 1932. William Swale’s three nephews — Ralph jun, John and William jun — also filled that office. John’s son Hamilton also served as club president during the 1970s.
Hamilton is now one of the club’s three surviving life members. "Ham" is funding a trophy for the winner of each race at the club’s race meeting on November 24.
William jun’s grandsons Sam Wheely and Matthew Boyle are present day (2024) committee members.
Wheely is shaping up as a future president while Boyle is an ideas man.
By John Langford
