Pimlico Race Course, circa 1916

Maryland Historical Society

Pimlico race course plays host each year to the largest sporting event in Maryland--the Preakness, middle jewel of thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown--which typically draws crowds of approximately 100,000.

One of two major thoroughbred race tracks in Maryland (the other being Laurel Park, near Washington, D.C.), Pimlico occupies a 140-acre site on Northern Parkway, approximately two miles west of I-83 (Jones Falls Expressway), just inside the northern boundary of Baltimore City.

Known fondly by many as “Old Hilltop,” due to a hill that once stood incongruously within its infield, Pimlico is the second oldest thoroughbred race track in the nation, preceded only by Saratoga in New York. Its former owner, the Maryland Jockey Club, traces back to the earliest origins of thoroughbred racing in the U.S.

The Maryland Jockey Club hosted the first organized thoroughbred race in the state, in 1743 in Annapolis, launching a flourishing tradition that continued at various sites in Maryland until brought to an abrupt halt by the Civil War. A bold initiative by Maryland’s horse-loving Governor Oden Bowie brought it back in the early post-war era, with the creation of a handsome and ornate new track called Pimlico.

At a gathering in Saratoga in 1868, Governor Bowie and other noted sportsmen came up with a plan for a race in which they could all enter their horses; the winner would host the losers at a dinner party afterwards. Governor Bowie, wishing to bring his state back into the forefront of the sport, promised to have a track built in time for the first running of the Dinner Party Stakes.

After returning home, Bowie exerted considerable pressure to make it happen. The Maryland Jockey Club underwent reorganization, with Bowie as president, and quickly completed the purchase of the original 70-acre tract of land (the core of the present-day site), at a cost of $23,500 from one Robert Wylie. Construction costs reportedly totaled a near-staggering $25,000. The most expensive feature was a rococo Victorian-style clubhouse, with three tall spires, which became a Baltimore landmark. It survived nearly a century as the oldest structure in American racing before fire destroyed it in 1966.

A fancy sporting facility deserved a fine name, and this one likely got its inspiration from a group of English

Twelve horses in backstrech, probably at Pimlico

Twelve horses in backstretch

Maryland Historical Society

settlers to the area in colonial days. The settlers had come from an area near London where the most famous landmark was Olde Ben Pimlico’s Tavern.

“They’re off!” (or perhaps an equivalent call) reverberated through the stands at Pimlico for the first time on October 25, 1870. The Dinner Party Stakes went off as planned--and was won by a colt named Preakness. Three years later, Pimlico held the first running of the race named in that colt’s honor. The Preakness Stakes has long since evolved into one of the nation’s premier events for three-year-old Thoroughbreds. It is held each year on the third Saturday in May.

Pimlico has offered many other racing events of national import throughout its long history. On October 24, 1877, the U.S. Congress adjourned so that its members could attend a race pitting against each other the champion of the West, Ten Broeck, and his Eastern rival Tom Ochiltree. A Pennsylvania-bred named Parole defeated them both in the kind of unpredictable performance that gives horse racing so much of its allure.

Perhaps the most famous race ever run at Pimlico was the 1938 match between Seabiscuit and War Admiral, which has been immortalized in Laura Hillenbrand’s best-selling book Seabiscuit and the popular movie based upon that account. Nearly all of the top race horses of the past century have performed at Pimlico, from Man o’ War and Citation to Native Dancer, Secretariat and the great Maryland-bred Cigar.

Pimlico has also drawn a wide array of distinguished human visitors, including national and state leaders. The late J. Edgar Hoover frequently attended the races at Pimlico during his years as director of the FBI.

The historic track currently operates under the ownership of Magna Entertainment Corporation (MEC), a company led by Canadian industrialist Frank Stronach. MEC purchased a majority interest in the Maryland Jockey Club in 2002.

Challmes, Joseph J. The Preakness: A History. Severna Park, Md.: Anaconda Pub. Co., 1975.