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Santa Anita Racetrack, located at 285 W. Huntington Drive, is the oldest racetrack in Southern California. The 'first' Santa Anita Racetrack was built on Elias Jackson ("Lucky") Baldwin's immense estate of "Rancho Santa Anita" and opened on December 7, 1907, but closed just two years later when horse racing was banned in California. In 1933, Hollywood director Hal Roach and San Francisco dentist Dr. Charles Strub formed the Los Angeles Turf Club and raised funds to build a new track. Designed in an Art Deco style by Gordon B. Kaufman, the "new" Santa Anita Park opened December 25, 1934. In 1942, racing at Santa Anita was suspended and Santa Anita was used as a Japanese American internment center from 1942-1944. The park is one of eleven detention camps included on California Historic Landmark #934. A downhill turf course was added in 1953 and in the 1960s, major renovations included a much-expanded grandstand as well as additional seating. In 1974 the Westfield Santa Anita Mall was built on the site of the old barns and training track. In 2007 the park added a synthetic "cushion" track to the existing turf course. The Park contains 61 barns, which house more than 2,000 horses, and an equine hospital. Photograph shows multitudes of spectators standing shoulder to shoulder in the inner field area watching a horserace already in full-action, as others stand in clusters farther back. Photograph dated January 5, 1948.
Type
image
Format
1 photographic print :b&w ;21 x 26 cm. Photographic prints
Santa Anita Park (Arcadia, Calif.) Racetracks (Horse racing)--California--Arcadia Horse racing--California--Arcadia Race horses--California--Arcadia Spectators--California--Arcadia Arcadia (Calif.) Valley Times Collection photographs Roach, Hal,1892-1992 Strub, Charles Kaufmann, Gordon B Baldwin, Elias Jackson,1828-1909
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