The Grand Project That Grew Into a Mighty Empire
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Racing Post Monday, November 26, 2012 15 TONY MORRIS’S BREEDING GREATS ORN in Karachi in 1877, Sultan Sir Mahomed Shah The ninth in a monthly series celebrating the achievements of ten breeders who have enjoyed outstanding success and was the third holder of the played crucial roles in the development of the thoroughbred in the course of the last 200 years. This month’s subject is B title Aga Khan, which had HH Aga Khan III, who founded an equine operation which has been passed down through the generations been bestowed on his Persian-born grandfather by the British government and became Champion Stakes. He also wound up recognised throughout the world. in America, where he became As a young man he visited champion sire and got a multiple William Hall Walker’s stud at Tully The grand project champion sire in Bold Ruler (sire (now the Irish National Stud), an himself of Secretariat), but it was experience which fired him with the Irishman Joe McGrath who was ambition to become a breeder of responsible for selling him to thoroughbreds, but many years passed Claiborne Farm; McGrath had bought before he took the first steps in that Nasrullah from the Aga several years direction. earlier. After the Great War he deemed that that grew into From the 1940s many of the Aga’s the time had come to embark on a horses were bred in partnership with project that he felt needed to be his son, Prince Aly Khan, the studs in undertaken thoroughly and on an Ireland and France routinely extensive scale. He approached delivering high-quality stock. It was George Lambton, asking him to Aly who negotiated the deal with become his trainer, but Lambton, a mighty empire French breeder Leon Volterra in May committed to handling Lord Derby’s 1948 for a £15,000 half-share in My string, had to decline. However, the Love, who a fortnight later became the Newmarket trainer did agree to buy fourth colt to carry the Aga’s colours yearlings for the Aga, and a start was to victory in the Derby. Blenheim, who gave him his first half-brother Bahram, who would win instructed the British Bloodstock made in 1921 with two filly The fifth and final Epsom success Derby victory. all three and earn recognition as the Agency to find buyers for both Bahram acquisitions at Newmarket in July and came more conventionally from a From the start the Aga’s horses had best horse the Aga ever bred. Product and Mahmoud, a task which naturally eight more at Doncaster (then the home-bred colt in 1952, a victory been in the care of Dick Dawson, but of a mare bought on his behalf by Dick did not prove difficult, and disposed of flagship Tattersalls sale) in September. which gave jockey Charlie Smirke, that arrangement came to an abrupt Dawson as a yearling for only 250gns, all his yearling colts at a valuation of Those initial purchases included who had been bullish beforehand, end after a stand-up row between Bahram was a champion at two and 400gns each. The price for Bahram Cos, the champion two-year-old filly licence to commit the fearful pun: three, retiring unbeaten after nine was £40,000 and for Mahmoud of 1922, Paola, who was to win the owner and trainer at Newbury in “What did I Tulyar?” starts. £20,000, both finding new homes in 1923 Coronation Stakes, and Teresina, 1931. The string left Whatcombe The mating of the mares in the The Aga won a third Derby in 1936 who excelled at four with wins in the the following day and was soon America. operation was, from the start, a role with Mahmoud, a son of Blenheim and Goodwood Cup and Jockey Club installed at Newmarket with Courting popularity was never a entrusted to Jean-Joseph Vuillier, Stakes. Lambton’s choices for his Frank Butters, and that grandson of Mumtaz Mahal, whom he high priority with the Aga, and the inventor of the so-called dosage patron in the following year, when the relationship endured until had tried unsuccessfully to sell as fact that he had sold all three of his system, and later assumed by his brief included colts as well as fillies, Butters was knocked off a yearling. Little more than a Derby winners to the States early in widow, Germaine. Just how much of proved exceptional. Among the males his bicycle in 1949, month after that Epsom triumph their stud careers made him the success derived from use of the were Classic heroes Diophon suffering injuries that he did sell Blenheim, for £45,000 numerous enemies. He was system was always debatable, given (2,000 Guineas) and Salmon-Trout caused his retirement. After to a syndicate of US breeders, much particularly detested by Lord Derby, that a top-class broodmare band was (St Leger), while the star filly was Butters had saddled Oaks to the disgust of European who also would not have been chuffed invariably treated to matches with Mumtaz Mahal, a champion at two winner Udaipur and breeders, who had further over the fact that his trainer had stallions of high quality, but there was and three, still revered as one of the four out of the first cause to deplore the Aga’s effectively set up the Aga’s breeding success right to the end. fastest of her sex ever foaled. five home in the evident readiness to empire and that his racing triumphs When the Aga died in July 1957, The seeds had been sown for the St Leger in accept the almighty had been achieved with Butters, there were still major triumphs to development of a hugely successful 1932, that dollar four years later. whom he had fired. come from the last crops he bred, stud, contemporaneous with those of partnership The Aga spent As it turned out, both Blenheim and delivered by the likes of Petite Etoile, formidable rivals in Lord Derby’s always was World War II in Mahmoud had stellar careers at stud Saint Crespin, Sheshoon and Stanley Stud and Marcel Boussac’s secure. neutral in the States, but Bahram proved a Charlottesville. Haras de Fresnay-le-Buffard. That was Switzerland, surprising failure. The last-named was Aly Khan’s sudden death in a car As always throughout his life, the the year in initially eventually off-loaded again to accident in 1960 left the bloodstock Aga was a dealer, and the first Classic which Dastur forming the Argentina, and his best sons, Big Game empire in the hands of a young man winner he ever bred he actually parted finished view that and Persian Gulf, were those left who professed no knowledge nor even with as a yearling at Deauville. She second in all the allies behind in England. interest in it. Fortunately, Karim, Aga was Taj Mah, successful in the 1929 three colts’ were The most successful stallion bred by Khan IV, quite soon developed a real 1,000 Guineas, but he was still buying Classics, but it unlikely to the Aga was the prodigiously gifted passion for the family business and yearlings, and Lambton’s selections also saw the prevail. In but wayward Nasrullah, whose took it to new heights, as next month’s in 1928 included, at 4,100gns, birth of his 1940 he principal triumph came in a wartime final part of this series will show. vvgr f Moti Mahal (foaled 1923, The vvbr f Toro (1954, Tudor Minstrel - Tetrarch - Maglona, by Fugleman). L’Horizon, by Bois Roussel). Poule Winner of the Coronation Stakes. NOTABLE HORSES BRED BY AGA KHAN III d’Essai des Pouliches. br f Amante (1955, Tehran - Pale Ale, vvb c Costaki Pasha (1926, b c Bahram (1932, Blandford - Friar’s b c Umiddad (1940, Dastur - Udaipur, Dasaratha, by Dastur). Irish St Leger. vv vv vv by Mannamead). Irish Oaks. Gainsborough - Cos, by Flying Orb). Daughter, by Friar Marcus). Champion by Blandford). Gold Cup. br f Nashua (1949, Nasrullah - vv b f Yla (1955, Migoli - Skylarking, by Middle Park S, Cork and Orrery S. at 2 and 3, unbeaten; Triple Crown. b c Claro (1943, Colombo - Clovelly, Dasaratha, by Dastur). Irish 1,000 vv b f Taj Mah (1926, Lemberg - Taj vv Mirza). Poule d’Essai des Pouliches. vv vvb c Bala Hissar (1933, Blandford - by Mahmoud). Irish 2,000 Guineas. Guineas. Mahal, by The Tetrarch). 1,000 Guineas. Voleuse, by Volta). Dewhurst S. vvb f Ginetta (1956, Tulyar - vvb c Khaled (1943, Hyperion - Éclair, vvb c Tulyar (1949, Tehran - Neocracy, Diableretta, by Dante). Poule d’Essai des vvb c Rustom Pasha (1927, Son-in-Law gr c Mahmoud (1933, Blenheim - vv by Ethnarch). Middle Park S., St James’s by Nearco). Best horse of the year at 3; Pouliches. - Cos, by Flying Orb). Eclipse S., Mah Mahal, by Gainsborough). Palace S. Derby, St Leger, Eclipse S., King gr f Petite Etoile (1956, Petition - Champion S. Champion 2-y-o; Derby S. gr c Migoli (1944, Bois Roussel - Mah George VI & Queen Elizabeth S. vv ch f Theresina (1927, Diophon - vv Star of Iran, by Bois Roussel). Champion vv vvb f Stafaralla (1935, Solario - Iran, by Bahram). Dewhurst S., Eclipse vvbr f Neemah (1950, Migoli - filly at 3 and 4; 1,000 Guineas, Oaks S., Teresina, by Tracery). Irish Oaks. Mirawala, by Phalaris). Cheveley Park S. S., Champion S., Prix de l’Arc de Naishapur, by Nearco). Champion 2-y-o b c Ut Majeur (1927, Ksar - Uganda, Sussex S., Yorkshire Oaks, Coronation vv vvb f Queen Of Shiraz (1937, Bahram Triomphe.