The New Brighton Museum is on the lookout for trotting memorabilia – but there is a catch.
It has to relate to the New Brighton Trotting Club, which operated at what became QEII Park, from 1895 to 1963, before relocating to Addington Raceway.
“We want anything and everything,” said museum president Wayne Hawker.
“That includes trainers’ colours, footage of any races, trophies, photos, cups, and racebooks.
“We have a fair bit of stuff already, but we are always keen for more. They would on-loan for the exhibition in October-November.”
The museum, now into its third decade, plans to hold an exhibition just before New Zealand Cup Week. It will also coincide with the city’s Heritage Week.
“We had 2500 through the doors – it was a great success,” Hawker said.
Trotting in New Brighton goes back about 140 years.
At a meeting at the Sawyers Arms Hotel, Papanui, in February 1883, the stewards “were empowered to select a course for races anywhere within the Avon Road District’’.
The stewards selected land that skirted the swamps near to New Brighton beach.
There was then a mixed trotting and racing programme, with the first race on the site held in 1886.
It was a start, but by all accounts the conditions were pretty rustic.
The land was then bought by Henry Mace, a soft drinks manufacturer, who built Brooklyn Lodge where he founded a stud plus training and racing stables.
He sank several wells for irrigation, upgraded the track and built accommodation for the public.
After leasing the new track from Mace, the New Brighton Trotting Club held its first official race meeting on March 16, 1895.
Henry Mace died in 1902, with Robert Button, a rich timber merchant at the time, taking over the property.
Button is best remembered as the father of Bella Button, a harness racing pioneer who was taking part in trotting events as far back as the 1890s. Two horses called Bella Button have since raced here, most recently an eight-win trotter trained by Mark Jones.
The club leased and then bought the land off the Button family. It evolved into a training centre, with the track as fast as any in the country.
A long list of champions, including Wildwood Junior, Reta Peter, Adelaide Direct, Willie Lincoln, Agathos, Onyx, Peter Bingen, Great Bingen, Harold Logan and Josedale Grattan, were trained on the New Brighton track. Reta Peter, a trotter, was a two-time New Zealand Cup winner in 1920 and 1921.
During World War 1, the army used the grounds for training exercises, although racing continued and prospered. That changed during World War 2 when the grounds were given over to the Defence Department and racing moved to Addington.
The club returned to its home patch in 1948 after the site had undergone an extensive makeover.
But the advent of night trotting changed everything.
By then the New Brighton club had decided to sell the site and move permanently to Addington.
Its last meeting was held on September 21, 1963, with the club merging with the Canterbury Park and the New Metropolitan Trotting Clubs in 1998.
The course was sold to the city council for $75,000.
A harness racing fan for decades, Hawker wants the museum’s exhibition to showcase the New Brighton Trotting Club’s significant contribution to harness racing in Canterbury.
In the last 40 years, he’s hardly missed a New Zealand Cup.
And his favourite? Borana’s 1985 win at odds of 70-to-one.
“I had $5 over $10 on it,” Hawker said. “And I also had the horse in the sweepstake at work!”
• For more information on the exhibition or to contact Wayne, email hawkerwm@hotmail.co.nz
