County’s horse racing heritage stands up to scrutiny – Yorkshire Post Letters

IT would be wonderful to see the restoration of the stand at the old Richmond racecourse (The Yorkshire Post, November 7). It is quite wrong, however, to describe this as “the world’s oldest surviving stone-built public grandstand”.

That distinction belongs to the John Carr Stand at York Racecourse. Opened in 1756 this was the first grandstand at any racecourse. Richmond, attributed to John Carr, was built more than 20 years later along with similar ones at Doncaster and Nottingham.

The York project was driven by the Marquess of Rockingham, a future prime minister and owner of Whistlejacket, the stallion celebrated in the well-known Stubbs painting. On opening day Whistlejacket won the first race and, in full view of the stand, two men were hanged at York’s Tyburn.

York’s Carr stand lost its upper storey and balcony roof in 1890 with the remaining arcade later removed to the north end. Richmond’s upper storey was demolished in the 1970s. Both buildings are important features of Yorkshire’s racing history and deserve preserving. There has always been some form of horse racing from the very earliest moment at which there were two horses and two Yorkshiremen in the County of Ridings.

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