In one year Percy Miller, a dominant figure in Australian breeding for nearly thirty years through to his death in 1948, took over one hundred yearlings to Inglis Easter Yearling Sale. Miller had the Kia Ora stud in the Segenhoe Valley near Scone and to get his yearlings to Sydney walked them to the nearby to town of Aberdeen railed them to Darling Harbour in Sydney and then, late at night, had them led to the Inglis Newmarket stables at Randwick.
They went down some weeks before the sales and were prepared for the market in the stables and paddocks at the centre, one which at that time was a much bigger area. Some other major vendors also had their yearlings prepared at Newmarket.
In his time at Kia Ora, country nestling between the Hunter and Pages rivers, Miller stood a number of good imported sires, including noted sources of good horses Magpie, Midstream and Delville Wood. The latter arrived just before Miller's death and went on to be five times champion sire in successive years in the 1950s.
Among the horses bred in the paddocks of Kia Ora and sold through Inglis Easter yearling sale were the Melbourne Cup winners Windbag, Delta and Evening Peal, the iconic miler Shannon and the great galloper Hydrogen. There were many more Australian national stars sold by Kia Ora, but they were but a handful of the graduates in the cavalcade of excellence that has materialized from the fall of the hammer at the Inglis sales at Newmarket in over century.
It is a cavalcade on which the curtain came down on this week as Inglis, a five generation family of horse salesmen, closed up their tenure at Newmarket.
They have transferred to a world class sales complex they have developed adjacent the river and racecourse at Warwick Farm, 30 kms south west of Sydney and will commence selling at the centre with an 800 lot Classic Yearling Sale catalogue presented over four sessions, February 10, 11, 12 and 13.
The catalogue appears possibly the biggest collection got together for a Sydney yearling sale, surpassing those presented at the Inglis Easter Yearling Sales at Newmarket in the 1950s and 1960s. At that time Easter was Sydney's only yearling market, and Australia's most prestigious. It was a four session series, the first three devoted to drafts from major breeders and the fourth to those only a small number. The 1954 Easter catalogue had 795 lots, some of which were withdrawn, and saw 655 find buyers.
The highest price that year was 6,500 guineas ($13,650), a vast difference to the $5million Black Caviar's half-brother by Redoute's Choice was knocked down for at Newmarket in 2013. He died before he got to the races.
Earlier horse salesmen in the city from 1865, Inglis moved to Newmarket, according to the late Doug Barrie's The Australian Bloodhorse in 1906 when they leased a property at Randwick owned by Tom Payten, a distinguished trainer.
He had purchased it in 1887 from his principal owner James White, an iconic colonial breeder and owner. White had built the 'mansion' on the property which still stands and which has been home for the Inglis family for three generations.
The Inglis purchased Newmarket in 1918 and in 1934 the good-will of their strongest competitor, H Chisholm & Company, and became Australia's leading thoroughbred marketer. An announcement of the acquisition appeared in the 1934 Inglis catalogue and pointed out that there would also be a Chisholm catalogue that year as it had been organized before the merger,
Inglis had 138 lots at the 1934 sale, none of which represented Kia Ora, Widden, Segenhoe, Arrowfield, Tarwyn Park or the Holbrook studs. The biggest vendors were The Angle Stud (Dubbo), Captain C J Chisholm (Khancoban Station), P E Brown (Randwick Lodge, Hunter Valley), Sir Hugh Denison (Sledmere, Scone), R J Edmonds (Larras Lake NSW), William Foster, (Cullengoral Stud, Gulgong), E A Haley (Te Koona, Wimbledon, Bathurst), Lyndhurst Stud (Warwick Qld –seven by The Buzzard), D U Seaton (Kingsfield Stud, Aberdeen), A P Wade (Borambola Park, Wagga Wagga) and E J Watt (Boomey, Molong).
Haley in the 1950s had the honour of buying a modestly priced New Zealand yearling off trainer Tommy Smith in the 1950s which under the name of Tulloch became one of the all time greats of Australian racing. Tulloch was put to stud at Te Koona, but was subsequently sold at Newmarket at a Te Koona dispersal following Haley's death. He was purchased for Haley's son Peter and shifted to Coonabarabran in north western NSW.
Inglis conducted their last sales
at Newmarket, the Easter yearlings and broodmares in 2017 and, as mentioned
earlier, begin in chapters in their thoroughbred history with a record sized
Classic sale catalogue on in February. The horses have galloped off to Warwick
Farm to make way for a mini city, one which eventually under Fig Tree Newmarket
will provide multi-story blocks offering about 650 residences – one, two and
three bedroom apartments, 2500 square metres of retail or commercial space and
5000 square metres of public area.
It could be a wonderful place to live, being a close neighbour of Randwick racecourse, the Showground and Cricket ground, ten minutes drive from Coogee beach and handy to the city.
Reminders of Newmarket's horse history will include the retained homestead, heritage stable blocks and the famous fig tree which spread a canopy over the northern end of the sale ring . A gathering place for the rich and poor, the famous and infamous, the tree may have been a foal when Newmarket became home for the Inglis horse salesmen.
Saplings from the fig tree are being planted at the new complex at Warwick Farm. Also the material used in the construction of the eleven horse barns includes timber from the original Newmarket complex. - Brian Russell Media
