STEVE DONOGHUE

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 101, 19 December 1931, Page 6

STEVE DONOGHUE

PEN PICTURE OF WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS JOCKEY DEFIED ADVERSITY There never has been another jockey described so possessingly as Steven Donoghue. "Our Steve." Once writes "C.A.L." in the London "Daily Express." I 'asked the late Frank Curzon why he called one of his horses Our Stephen. His reply was illuminating — "Well, he is — and you know it." It will not be many years before Steven is 50, but such a Peter Pan will never leave his treetops and his dreams. He is made that way. He ought to have built up a banking account as well which would make even the "Old Lady of Threadneedle Street" say, "Come right inside." But would he have been the same appealing little man if he had dotted his I's and crossed his T's through a remarkable riding career? An Irish name and a humble Warrington birth were his only original assets. They have carried a lad from Lancashire across many leagues of rocky road. Donoghue's four crossroads to his Destiny have all been traversed. Success and Popularity remain on his beaten track; Wealth and Retirement have long been his discarded main roads, for easy travelling is'not in his make-up. That is perhaps why he shines most on a course like Epsom. Never Courted World Fred Archer was before my time. The ojd-stagers tell me how this longlegged "Tinman" stood alone, and how he reiused to make himself "Lord" Archer by marriage. That was an individual case. Donoghue has had the racing world at his feet, and yet he has never courted the world. It has all just happened,. because he is "Our Steve." "He is in the news again. You can't stifle him," is a common remark. That is a fact. Donoghue can do little that is ordinary without its seeming out of the ordinary. As a lad he walked from Warrington to Middleham to apprentice himself to Dobson Peacoek. And he broke his indentures and walked home again. He found his way, with his brother, to a small stable in the south of France, and once again he went home to a devoted mother — who watched his triumphs many years later — because another lad was given the best mounts. He took the name of Donoghue to Ireland, and he rode for Mr. Persee at Stockbridge. He talked in millions when he rode for the late James White, and he rode four Derby winners at Epsom after the war. He must have made over

£50,000 on paper one year, and have been short of ready money the same Christmastide. His second marriage is only a year or two old. Hi^ American wife is crazy on him. What is there about this Donoghue? I know he has Temperament with a capital T and "It" with a capital I. If he were in more trouble than usual you would want to cry. When he is top dog you shriek, "Come on, Steve!" and almost bow down to a modest man with a soul-searching look, and MODESTY — with seven capital letters, please. I have almost forgotten to remark that he was a great jockey, and still is a master, because horses seem to run so very kindly for him. Defied Adversity There have been greater and stronger jockeys, but none more attuned to horses and none who has defied such amazing adversity amid the riches which come the way of a fashionable rider. He can manage

a horse, but can put the blinkers on himself. The human note in Steve predominates. He would never have been the great man of racing if he had concentrated on topping Richards' or Fox's banking accounts. I asked him how, as a badly crocked man, who seemed then to be a "has-been,"he had enjoyed his last winter. "I am going to California again after racing is over," he replied, "because though no longer the Donoghue, they treated me second only to the Prince of Wales, and even an official air fleet piloted my private 'plane from Havana to California without my knowing anything about it. "What is your secret, Steve?" I asked as I looked closely at him, and did not wait for a reply.