Scarborough Downs and the death rattles of a sport

After 70 years of racing, Scarborough Downs has closed, pushing an esoteric sport closer to the brink threatening the economic and civic vitality of another small community.

In June of 1980, over 9,000 people crowded into a relatively small racetrack in Southern Maine to watch the horses and get an autograph from Lou Ferrigno. Forty years later, not even the Incredible Hulk could save Scarborough Downs.

The slow death of harness horse racing — in which a jockey sits not on top of a horse but in a wheeled cart behind — is quickening its pace. The track in Scarborough, Maine, which opened in 1950, held its final race day on Nov. 28, 2020.

At its height, the Downs — situated in the wealthy suburban enclave of Scarborough — attracted thousands of men in dress shirts and bowler hats and women in long dresses and gloves. Families gathered in the grandstand, which was filled in the 1960s and 70s. Today, the odds scoreboard remains, along with much of the original infrastructure. An online review of the track suggests the bathrooms also have not been updated in 50 years. In recent years, though, the Downs was lucky to attract a few hundred patrons. Dilapidated and neglected, the wooden benches outside creak as Maine’s early spring winds rip through the area. The building that overlooks the track looks like the site of an abandoned government initiative. Gray and weather-beaten, its windows present an imposing front.

Every year, the Scarborough Downs faithful convinced themselves that springtime was a state of mind, shoveled remaining snow to the side of the dirt track, and put on the races. It is not easy work to put together a day of races. The track has to stock food, train tellers, set odds, house horses, and manicure the grounds, among many other tasks. And while they did all of this for a shrinking crowd, as it grew smaller it also grew more faithful. Mainers scraped ice off of their own cars and drove for hours in the early spring to catch opening day every year. In 2021, they won’t have that option.

The Downs was the victim of national trends. Between 2003 and 2017, betting on racing dropped by 50 percent. More than $100 million in tax dollars was pumped into the industry in Maine in the last two decades, but the crowds continued to shrink. In January of 2018, the owner of Scarborough Downs, Sharon Terry, sold the property for $6.7 million to Crossroads Holdings LLC, which has begun to develop a mixed-use suburb in Scarborough, complete with office buildings and rows of condos.

Given that Scarborough Downs was primarily a gambling institution, it’s difficult to argue that the place was a manifest public good. But it was a job creator in the sports sector, which COVID-notwithstanding is in the middle of tremendous growth. Accounting firm PwC predicted in 2019 that the revenue from sports in America would jump from $71.1 billion in 2019 to $83.1 billion in 2023. The problem for places like Scarborough Downs is, there’s a widening gap between the rich and the poor in the sector.

Television deals alone net major sports billions in revenue. ESPN pays the NFL $2 billion a year just to broadcast Monday Night Football. The median ticket prices at NFL and NBA games hover around $100. The median ticket at an MLB game is cheap relative to the other major sports, but is still $34. Major League Baseball netted $10.7 billion in gross revenue in 2019.

That money, though, isn’t trickling down. Major League Baseball is axing 42 minor league teams, which operate mostly in small towns across the U.S. These teams don’t bring in as much revenue, partly because the experience itself is cheaper and more intimate. Minor League Baseball stadiums are relatively small and they charge around $8 for a ticket. Minor League Baseball teams also pay their players next to nothing.

The hollowing out of local sports institutions brings with it a loss of jobs, community centers, and tradition. Connection to many local sports venues, Scarborough Downs included, stretches back generations.

One of the most promising young jockeys who calls Scarborough home is Matthew “Matty Ice” Athearn. His grandfather, Edward Rohr, was an avid harness racing fan for his whole life, and saved to purchase the mare “Knightly Blue Girl,” in 1989. Matty’s aunt, Heidi Rohr, is a top trainer in Massachusetts and New York and his mother Gretchen trains at Scarborough. His dad, Mark, drives horses at Scarborough as well — they’ve shared the track many times.

Matty remembers attending night racing in Scarborough with his dad, mom, and grandfather, which he called “almost like a Friday night football game.”

There are all kinds of reasons to hate horse racing. It is an antiquated sport in which obscenely rich people get a little richer and have a little fun doing it, all at the expense of the horses, who are often treated poorly, and people much less wealthy than these owners with gambling problems. It’s also beautiful, though, in its simplicity and its temporality. The Kentucky Derby, horse racing’s most famous event, is often referred to as “the most exciting two minutes in sports.” Horses and jockeys train for years for their one moment in the sun, and when they succeed, the exaltation is unique.

Now that Scarborough Downs is closed, all of the jockeys and trainers will have to find a new home track or get out of the game entirely. The security guards, tellers who worked there for years, and beloved announcer Mike Sweeney, will have to find other places of employ. Mike Ciancetti, a grandson of a track owner himself, is leading a group trying to find a new place for regular harness racing in Maine. The people who are in the harness racing family are fiercely committed to its success, even in the face of increasingly long odds.

“At first, when I was younger I really didn’t like [racing]. I’d rather be playing baseball… Then I started to understand, I really enjoyed watching my dad drive and my grandfather,” Athearn said. “You fall in love with it sooner or later.”

People around the country who are watching their generational livelihoods slip away share the conundrum of the Scarborough Downs faithful. Traditional, smaller streams of revenue have been supplanted by big corporations. For Matty Ice, like any prince in line for a throne, his participation in the sport of kings is both his bloodright and all he can ever see himself doing.

“You’re born into it,” Athearn said. “You don’t have a choice.”

Matty is part of the family business, an economic model that stretches back centuries. The American 20th century promised bigger businesses that would generate more wealth. But if that wealth is circulated only to a few people, or a few sports, who does it help? It does Matty no good that American sports could soon generate $100 billion in revenue a year if he doesn’t see any of it. Only certain industries pay well, no matter your capabilities. By all accounts, Matty is one of the best young harness jockeys in the country. If the sport’s tailspin gets worse, what should he do? Learn to code?