Horse tales of Tom Rankin
Construction industry CEO will open his horse barn to the public on Saturday
Tom Rankin stands in the heart of horse central, a small paddock outlined by a white fence on his farm in rural St. Catharines.
Mama horses and their foals approach him with juvenile curiosity to nuzzle his jacket.
Down the road on St. Paul Street West is a training centre where his standardbred horses jog laps around a track pulling sulky and driver. He owns some 40 horses and 60 hectares of farmland.
Since January, six babies were born with one more due soon.
Here is where Rankin, the 78-year-old construction industry icon, engineer, CEO of Rankin Construction and philanthropist, finds peace. Every Saturday morning, he spends a few hours passing time, trading jokes with barn staff and watching the horses run.
On this day, three of his horses are running qualifying times at Woodbine Mohawk Park in Milton, and he checks his phone frequently for updates. He rarely misses a race, often streaming them on his phone.
This Saturday, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., he will open his barn to the public, a gesture to get kids excited about horses and to support the come-
back of the Youth Literary Derby, a writing contest for children in grades 5 to 8.
Kids can write a poem or short story about a standardbred foal and open houses at barns across the province are serving as inspiration.
The contest ran in the 1970s, initiated by Bill Galvin, then a writer and publicist with the Ontario Jockey Club. At age 87, he is a Canadian horse racing historian, poet, educator and member of the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame.
He brought horse racing to the ice of the Rideau Canal. And he organized the Race for MS fundraiser. And now he wants to rekindle a passion among children for horses.
Rankin is the contest’s sponsor. However, for much of his life, the closest equine connection he formed was with the draft horse that delivered milk to his childhood home in Timmins.
Some 30 years ago, that changed.
His friend, George, knew a guy who was selling a yearling for $15,000. Rankin wasn’t a horse guy then. “George, I have little or no interest,” he told his friend.
But then, after watching one of the last races of Cam Fella, a legendary harness racing pacer, Rankin had a change of heart.
“Does the horse have four legs?” he asked his friend.
He was in. He paid $3,750 and had a quarter ownership of Fundaben,
a standardbred filly.
Alas, the horse did not have four legs. She pulled a tendon and her racing career ended before it began. Not to be defeated, Rankin and his brother bought out the other two owners for $1 each, and paid some $3,000 to breed her with a stallion with an impressive geneology.
He named her filly, Three Pearls, in honour of his mother, Pearl.
She raced for two years and earned Rankin some $120,000. “This is an easy game,” he thought.
He was hooked. “Two minutes of horse racing is about as exciting a two minutes you can have in your lifetime,” he said.
Soon after, he found himself at an auction where he bought three
more yearlings. One raced, but didn’t break records, and two became breeding mares. His family of horses expanding, he needed a farm.
He bought his first 16 hectares of farmland along St. Paul Street West. It’s his place of peace.
“Five days a week, I have stress,” he said. In the barn, there is none.
“I do next to nothing. I tell jokes and keep the guys happy,” he said.
He enjoys keep track of their progress — how fast they can run a mile.
One winter morning, he hopped on a sulky and enjoyed a cold but exhilarating spin around the track. Just for fun. In the past 25 years, he’s had some 200 babies born in his barn, equipped with
video monitors so a delivery is not missed.
“I was there for the first 100 foals,” he said.
These days farm manager Todd Wark is they guy who pulls night shifts when mares are in labour. One horse had a tough delivery during a recent ice storm and he had the veterinarian on speaker phone guiding him. All turned out well.
Horses have given Rankin so much, he wants to others to experience a similar joy.
“A horse is a beautiful animal,” he said. “They make an everlasting impression.”