📖 About this Collection
Secretariat: The Superhorse Who Redefined What Was Possible
The Legend & The Legacy
In 1973, a massive chestnut colt known as Big Red did something no horse had done in a quarter century, and then did it in a way no horse had done at all. Secretariat won the Triple Crown—the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness, and the Belmont—ending a twenty-five-year drought, but it was the manner of his victories that turned an athlete into a myth. His Kentucky Derby was run in a time that still stands as the record. And his Belmont Stakes remains perhaps the single greatest performance in the history of sport: he won by an astonishing thirty-one lengths, alone down the stretch, his nearest rival a distant speck, in a display of raw dominance so complete it seemed to bend the rules of competition. Guided by owner Penny Chenery, trainer Lucien Laurin, and jockey Ron Turcotte, he captured the imagination of a country badly in need of a hero. When he died, an autopsy revealed a heart more than twice the normal size—a fitting literal explanation for a horse who ran like nothing before or since.
Inside the Archive
The vintage press covered Secretariat as a genuine national sensation. In the spring and summer of 1973 he became one of the rare athletes—let alone horses—to appear on the covers of the major news and sports magazines in the same season, his powerful stride splashed across the country. Sports titles broke down his record-shattering races, while general-interest magazines profiled the people around him and the phenomenon he had become. In the decades since, retrospectives have only elevated his standing, ranking his Belmont among the greatest athletic achievements ever recorded and cementing Big Red as the standard against which every great racehorse is measured.
Curator's Checklist: Highlights Often Include
- The Triple Crown: Coverage of the 1973 sweep that ended a twenty-five-year drought.
- The Belmont Miracle: Features on the thirty-one-length victory regarded as one of sport's greatest feats.
- Big Red: Profiles of the colt and the connections—Chenery, Laurin, Turcotte—who guided him.
- A National Sensation: Coverage from the season he appeared across the major magazine covers.
- Legacy: Retrospectives ranking him among the greatest racehorses and athletes of all time.
The Collector's Value
An original magazine featuring Secretariat is a primary document of the moment a racehorse became a cultural phenomenon. These issues preserve, in the language of their own era, the awe of a nation watching an athlete perform at the very edge of what seemed possible. For collectors of horse racing, 1970s sport, or great sporting moments, few names carry more thunder. Explore our current inventory below to see which chapter of Secretariat's story is available today.
