One of the greatest race horses of the 20th century, Seabiscuit,
appeared on the scene as an undersized mustang
“with a sad little tail and knees that wouldn’t straighten all
the way. At a gallop, he jabbed one foreleg sideways, as if he were
swatting flies.”
One of the greatest race horses of the 20th century, Seabiscuit, appeared on the scene as an undersized mustang “with a sad little tail and knees that wouldn’t straighten all the way. At a gallop, he jabbed one foreleg sideways, as if he were swatting flies.”
On the best seller list of the New York Times as well as being made into a movie, Laura Hillenbrand’s, “Seabiscuit, An American Legend,” proclaims that he was the greatest racehorse of all time.
With an astonishing fast-paced beginning, author Laura Hillenbrand exposes the history of the race horse, “Seabiscuit, An American Legend,” and the Howard family. Several years ago, I bought the book because I thought my spectacular cousin, Louise Howard, was the wife of Charles Howard, owner of Seabiscuit. I wanted to find out more about my cousin, Amanda Louise Anderson Carroll McDonald Howard.
Surprisingly, however, my cousin was not in the book.
I did have a spotty genealogy of Louise that listed 1914 as the year of her birth; then, from the book, I calculated that C. S. Howard, Seabiscuit’s owner, had been 38 when Louise was born. All indications, then, pointed to the fact that my cousin, Louise, married Charles Howard, Jr., one of the sons of first wife, Fannie Mae.
In fact, that was confirmed when in a read a response from Fred Carroll on Ms. Hillenbrand’s Web site.
“My mother, Louise, was married to C. S. Howard, Jr., a son of CS, Senior, for the last twelve years of his life until he died in the late ‘60’s,” it said.
You see, my cousin had married Fred Carroll’s father; then, later, she married C. S. Howard, Junior.
In 1993, I met my cousing Louise Howard when she elegantly entered the door of Campton Place just off Union Square in San Francisco. She was 78-years-old and wearing a black blazer, very short, but tasteful black leather skirt, and a black bowler hat. Louise held the arm of her sprightly 80-year-old gentleman friend, who wore his straw hat askew, walking stick in hand, bow tie accessorizing a tatter sol-check three piece suit.
Louise recently had been informed by her Texas relatives that my wife and I were California relatives living near San Francisco, and she invited us to meet for lunch.
Actually, her father and my grandfather were brothers, who came from Louisiana in the 1890’s to establish a resort in Sutherland Springs, Texas. The resort was never built.
No matter, in this refined San Francisco venue, Campton Place, we talked of many things. We heard fetching stories from her son, Fred and wife, Nina, who had just returned from a climbing expedition in the mountains of Nepal.
Over small talk, it became apparent that Louise and her gentleman friend were well known, here, at the Campton Place.
We talked of the Anderson history in Sutherland Springs, Texas. We discussed the fact that my grandfather’s brother, Uncle Jim, Louise’s father, married twice. Louise was the last born of the four children from Aunt Hattie, Uncle Jim’s second wife. Her father had 10 children from his first marriage before that wife died. Then, he married Hattie, my Grandmother’s sister, who bore him four more children. (Yes. My grandmother, Amanda Medora Brown, married my grandfather, John Anderson; then convinced her sister, Hattie Brown, to marry her husband’s brother, Jim, as his second wife.)
On that Campton Place day, we discovered an immense Anderson genealogy. And, exposed many ancient family curiosities.
As she left, my cousin Louise, jauntily turned her cheek upward to my face. Realizing the gentlemanly thing to do, I gave her a goodbye peck.
Fast forward some 12 years and to our next meeting in the last week of August. Two days before her 91st birthday, Louise Howard visited us in Morgan Hill. Her daughter, Jackie, drove from Pasadena and brought Louise as well as Louise’s granddaughter-in-law who was carrying Louise’s great-grandchild.
These lovely ladies stopped by on their way to San Francisco where they would meet Louise’s son, Fred, whose investment business is there. From San Francisco, they, all, would journey to Fred’s ranch near Burney in northern California’s Shasta area.
Again, we talked of all the many family members. Of our fantastic genealogy going back to the 1800’s. In the genealogy, we observed our common ancestor, Stacy Washington Anderson, who married Francis Aquilla Myrick and had four sons. Nevertheless, we noted that he joined the 37th Mississippi in 1860, fought until January-February 1864 when he became AWOL. Nine months later his last son, Stacy Washington Anderson, Jr., was born. However, our patriarch went back to battle with the 37th Mississippi and in July was wounded by a miniball to his thigh. He was captured by the Army of The Cumberland. The surgeons amputated his right leg on July 15, 1864. On August 15, 1864, Stacy Washington Anderson died.
We heard ancient recordings of Louise’s now deceased brother, Fred, as he described growing up in Sutherland Springs that I had made many years ago. Sipping her glass of wine, Amanda Louise Anderson Carroll McDonald Howard, at one time a gorgeous movie star, but still the ultimate lady, queen, and matriarch, held our attention.
Surprisingly, she told us that Stacy Washington Anderson, Jr. the son born after his father died, came to California. This Anderson, her uncle, who established the S and W Paper Co. in Los Angeles as well as the Model Grocery in Pasadena, took her at 16 out of backwoods Sutherland Springs, Texas and brought her to California where she thrived.
No matter that I have met my cousin, Louise Howard, twice, I heartily maintain that she is the most vivacious person I have ever met.
Louise is 91, now. She still lives in a penthouse on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles; but with her daughter, visits her son in San Francisco at every opportunity.
Such are fascinating stories of thoroughbreds.
