Preakness 2026: How Laurel Park became horse racing’s global stage
LAUREL, Md. — The odds are that Laurel Park will never see another big crowd as it hosts the Preakness Stakes on Saturday and then transitions into retirement as a training track. Laurel opened in 1911 and, from its start, competed as a distant second to Pimlico in Maryland.
Seabiscuit was trained at Laurel in 1938 before the big match race with War Admiral. For many years, Laurel was owned by James Butler, an Irish-born grocery magnate whose stores were second only to the A&P in New York City. In 1950, Baltimore business owner Morris Schapiro bought the Laurel track and gave it to his son, John D.
Schapiro, to run. This is where the Laurel story gets interesting. Morris Schapiro was an American immigrant success story.
He arrived in the country from Latvia in 1902 with little money and later salvaged bricks from the 1904 Baltimore fire. This led to owning a successful scrap-iron firm, and during Prohibition, he owned the Globe Brewery (Arrow beer) and a whiskey distillery. He was permitted to brew a weak beer and full-strength whiskey for medical purposes, sold through a prescription.
He prospered and by 1927 was living in a grand mansion overlooking Druid Lake. Morris Schapiro bought the Laurel track at a time when Maryland was racing crazy, but Laurel, as a track, did not own a race that was in the same league as the Preakness. Marketing people suggested that Laurel land a marquee event that would focus attention on what had been just another racetrack.
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