Louisville Old-Timer Recalls His Favorite Kentucky Derby Races

The Kentucky Derby has changed quite a bit since Ed Hasenour, now 76, paid 25-cents as a teen-ager for the right to climb a ladder to sneak into Churchill Downs.

“I used to pay a quarter to climb a fence and jump down,” said Hasenour, a semi-retired restaurant operator. “Who’d I pay? The fellow who owned the ladder. There were several ladders back then.”

The fence-climbing ladders are gone from Churchill Downs, put out of business by a 15-foot brick wall along Central Avenue and chain-link fences topped by barbed wire along the stable area of the security-conscious home of the Derby.

“I can think of a lot of good Derbies,” reminisced the white-haired Hasenour, whose business skills have promoted him from the ladder corps to the socially acceptable clubhouse where tickets are passed from generation to generation.

Although he was too young to see it, one of his all-time favorite Derbies was in 1913, when his father won enough on Donerail -- who paid $184.90 on a $2 bet -- to buy the lumber for a new house. His father lost the house during the Depression in 1936 under the burden of a mortgage on the land and privately installed sewer lines.

Hasenour, a family man with grandchildren, said he went solo to the Derby as a young man, preferring to roam the clubhouse and infield.

“I usually went out there by myself,” Hasenour said as he carefully used a pocket knife to cut a thread off a tablecloth at the family-owned restaurant now run by his son. “I take my wife now.”

Years ago, Hasenour said, “They didn’t have quite the crowd they have today. It was a little more subdued.”

Asked if there were any scenes similar to the bare-breasted women tossed about on blankets in recent Derbies, the church-going Hasenour frowned and shook his head. “Of course, they’ve always had drunks,” he added.

Hasenour recalls the 1921 Derby won by Behave Yourself and ’26 Derby winner Bubbling Over, both owned by Lexington’s E.R. Bradley. “I always respected Mr. Bradley,” Hasenour said. He had good reason. Bradley horses finished 1-2 in both 1921 and 1926 -- Behave Yourself and Black Servant, Bubbling Over and Bagenbaggage.

In between the Bradley winners, the 50th anniversary Derby in 1924 -- won by Black Gold -- was “one of the outstanding Derbies. I will never forget that one,” Hasenour said with a smile, waving off any demand for details.

For the record, odds-on favorite Black Gold rallied from third place in the stretch to beat 15-1 shot Chilhowee by a half length with with Bradley’s Beau Butler and two other rivals a fraction behind.

Today’s Derby crowd, in addition to being bigger, is more fun, Hasenour said. Years ago, Derby-goers from New York, Chicago and Pennsylvania -- “millionaires and railroad people” -- would travel to Louisville in private trains, sleeping and eating on the train while stopped near Preston Street.

“It made them less interested in the community,” Hasenour said.

As the railroad era ended, out-of-town guests would patronize hotels and restaurants including his own, which had a 1961 souvenir mail-home menu offering $3.50 lobster tails and a $4.50 steak, the most expensive item.

Hasenour almost got more than he bargained for in 1965 when a kitchen fire broke out in the aging clubhouse beneath the Twin Spires. But the clubhouse wasn’t evacuated and the Derby came off without a hitch, he said.

Betting-wise, dozens of winners have passed by Hasenour without his cashing a mutuel ticket, although he recollects betting on winners Tim Tam in 1958 and Secretariat in 1973. “And it seems like I had some in recent years,” he said.

Hasenour has been able, with the help of coveted clubhouse box seats, to entertain friends, relatives and out-of-town guests at the Derby in recent years and has gained a new appreciation for the Run for the Roses.

About 15 years ago, Hasenour said, a guest from Miami wept openly during the playing of “My Old Kentucky Home” at Derby post time.

Later, Hasenour asked why she had cried and she responded, “The Derby is in your backyard and it doesn’t mean anything to you. Down in Florida, we think it’s the greatest sporting spectacle.”