Seabiscuit: An American Legend
by By Hillenbrand, Laura
Category: Sports & Recreation , History

Laura Hillenbrand, author of the runaway phenomenon Unbroken, brilliantly re-creates a universal underdog story in this #1 New York Times bestseller.Seabiscuit was one of the most electrifying and popular attractions in sports history  and the single biggest newsmaker in the world in 1938, receiving more coverage than  FDR, Hitler, or Mussolini.  But his success was a surprise to the racing establishment,  which had written off the crooked-legged racehorse with the sad tail.  Three men  changed Seabiscuit’s fortunes: Charles Howard was a onetime bicycle repairman who  introduced the automobile to the western United States and became an overnight millionaire.   When he needed a trainer for his new racehorses, he hired Tom Smith, a mysterious  mustang breaker from the Colorado plains.  Smith urged Howard to buy Seabiscuit for  a bargain-basement price, then hired as his jockey Red Pollard, a failed boxer who  was blind in one eye, half-crippled, and prone to quoting passages from Ralph Waldo  Emerson.  Over four years, these unlikely partners survived a phenomenal run of bad  fortune, conspiracy, and severe injury to transform Seabiscuit from a neurotic, pathologically  indolent also-ran into an American sports icon.From the Hardcover edition.