Inaugurated with royal blessing in 1860, the Queen’s Plate is the longest continuously run stakes race in North America and the first jewel in Canada’s Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing. This compilation is the first full history of how this prestigious annual event evolved from a petition granted by Queen Victoria to a little turf club in Toronto to the country’s most famous, one-day social and sporting event. Featuring many never-before-seen archival photographs and profiles of every winner, each year of the event is presented and examined in detail. Though the original site is now a traffic-congested street corner and the first-place prize has changed from “a plate to the value of fifty Guineas” to a purse of one million dollars, the Queen’s Plate remains the event that established Canadian horse racing as “the sport of royalty.”

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Beverley Smith has covered figure skating for The Globe and Mail since 1980. She has written commentary and stories about the sport at 16 world championships and 22 Canadian figure skating championships and is the author of three previous books about figure skating.

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