Still Going after All These Years: Truth, Text and the Racing Calendar

Abstract

When The Turf was published in 1976, Wray Vamplew could not have imagined that his contribution to the economic and social history of horseracing had only just begun and was to span the next thirty years. [1] None of his subsequent books, articles or conference papers on racing topics as diverse as the impact of the Victorian railways, the demise of the Edwardian gentleman rider, the bizarre and often dangerous life of the twentieth-century professional jockey or the rise and fall of the Jockey Club could have been written – let alone quantified – without recourse to ‘the official organ of the racing authorities’, the Racing Calendar. [2] This paper will briefly outline its history, analyse its contents and attempt to evaluate its worth as a comprehensive and reliable source. It will then seek to illustrate some ways in which historians of racing can still use this extraordinary sporting series.