Keeneland Library. (Keeneland Photo)
Keeneland Library Lecture Series to Feature Horseman Josh Pons, Sports Commentator Tom Hammond
Tickets on sale at Keeneland.com/library
Keeneland Release
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Keeneland Library’s popular Lecture Series returns with presentations by two Eclipse Award winners: Maryland horseman and journalist Josh Pons, author of Letters from Country Life: Adolphe Pons, Man o’ War, and the Founding of Maryland’s Oldest Thoroughbred Farm, on Aug. 29 and NBC Sports’ Emmy Award-winning commentator and expert racing analyst and enthusiast Tom Hammond, whose new autobiographyis Races, Games, and Olympic Dreams: A Sportscaster’s Life, on Sept. 24.
Both programs will be held at Keeneland Library from 6:30-8:30 p.m. ET. Each presentation will be followed by a reception and book signing, and a limited number of books will be available for purchase.
To purchase tickets, please visit Keeneland.com/library or call 859 254-3412.
Partial proceeds from ticket sales benefit the Keeneland Library Foundation, which supports the Library’s preservation, education and outreach projects. In the first half of 2024, Keeneland Library engaged with more than 51,000 community members, industry stakeholders and racing fans from across the U.S. and 18 countries through its free exhibits and youth and adult education and outreach programs.
Pons’ rich family history
Letters from Country Life: Adolphe Pons, Man o’ War, and the Founding of Maryland’s Oldest Thoroughbred Farm depicts a century of life inside the horse business, written from Maryland’s oldest Thoroughbred farm.
Adolphe Pons, Pons’ grandfather, was personal secretary to financier August Belmont II, who bred Man o’ War. In 2016, Josh Pons discovered thousands of letters from his grandfather’s life in the basement of his farmhouse that became a beloved column in BloodHorse for which he won two Eclipse Awards for outstanding magazine writing. In Letters from Country Life, Pons draws from the farm’s rich archive and reflects on how the past influences the present.
“Researching stories in the Keeneland Library opened my mind to Thoroughbred history when I was a cub reporter at BloodHorse in the 1970s,” said Pons, a graduate of the University of Kentucky Law School who served as president of the Maryland Horse Breeders Association for six years. “To research August Belmont, his famous Nursery Stud on the Georgetown Pike where Man o’ War was born and my grandfather’s role as Belmont’s secretary, I began Letters from Country Life back where I started, in the archives of the Keeneland Library, a resource Keeneland shares for the benefit of everyone in the horse industry.”
Hammond’s reflections
Hammond, who received the 2023 Special Eclipse Award for Career Excellence, spent 10 years as an announcer at Keeneland Sales early in his storied career.
In Races, Games, and Olympic Dreams: A Sportscaster’s Life, Hammond and cowriter Mark Story, sports columnist for the Lexington Herald Leader, reveal how a Kentucky native who began reading horse racing results on Lexington radio went on to become one of the nation’s top broadcasters. Hammond most prominently was the longtime host of NBC Sports’ coverage of the Triple Crown and Breeders’ Cup World Championships, highlighted by American Pharoah’s historic 2015 ‘Grand Slam’ during which he won the Triple Crown and Breeders’ Cup Classic (G1) at Keeneland.
As part of the NBC Sports broadcast team, Hammond covered 13 Olympic Games, anchoring track and field, gymnastics, figure skating and speed skating, among others. He was a play-by-play announcer on NFL games and was the lead voice for Notre Dame football on NBC.
“I’m extremely honored to be a part of the Keeneland Library Lecture Series, which I have attended many times,” Hammond said. “As detailed in our book, Keeneland has been a very important part of my life. I fell in love with Thoroughbred racing while at Keeneland and have broadcast from there many times on both radio and TV.
“As a college student I learned the basics of racing coverage in the Keeneland Press Box; at both WVLK and WLEX I hosted popular racing shows; spent many years as the Sales announcer; and now have a spot as a spectator in the Press Box,” he added. “One only needs to notice the setting on the cover of the book to see how important Keeneland is to me.”
