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YEAR: 2009

Don Nyhan with Livingston Road
DON NYHAN

The death occurred in Christchurch last Sunday of Don Nyhan. Aged 99, Nyhan gained fame and respect for developing two champions - Johnny Globe and Lordship. After long and successful years on the track, they became premier sires.

Johnny Globe was champion sire four times from 1969/70 to 1972/73, and Lordship headed the list in 1979/80, and followed that by leading the broodmare list on four occasions.

Don bought Johnny Globe as a foal for his late wife Doris for £50 from the horse's Pahiatua breeder, F E Ward. He had trained his dam Sandfast for Ward, and knew she had ability after a time trial over a mile in 2.10 at Hutt Park as a 2-year-old. Johnny Globe became a crowd favourite, winning the 1954 NZ Cup from 48 yards in 4.07 3/5, which was a world record. He retired with 34 wins from 99 starts, 15 of them free-for-alls, and four world records. He was given an official farewell at Addington in December, 1956.

From the stately Globe Derby Lodge, Nyhan produced Lordship to follow in his footsteps. He won 45 races from 137 starts, and his stake earnings of $115,190 were easily a record for a thoroughbred or standardbred. He won two NZ Cups, 16 free-for-alls, and among his stock was the great Lord Module.

Among many other fine performers he trained were Dresden Lady, Gold Flight, Vagas, Au Fait, Lords and Koarakau.

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DAVID McCARTHY writing in The Press 31Oct09

Obituaries of leading horsemen often rely on lists. Lists of races won, top horses trained, trophies on the mantlepiece. After 80 years working with horses however, Don Nyhan, who died in Christchurch last week in his 100th year, was always associated with just two names - Johnny Globe and Lordship.

The two most popular pacers to grace Addington in the last six decades, their reputation was partly a reflection of the values of the of the Nyhan family itself and the esteem they earned from the racing public. Nyhan and Doris, his late wife and best friend of 70 years, were ornaments of the trotting world in its peak years, respectively racing Johnny Globe and Lordship.

Modest winners, gracious losers, their focus unaffected by success, their chief enjoyment was the friends they made in racing. They loved their horses, valued their family and devoted their lives to both. No breath of scandal ever touched the horses housed at the immaculate Globe Lodge in Templeton. The Addington public clutching their precious 10 shillings each way ticket knew they would at least get a run for their money from the horses in the black, pink-crossed sashes and sleeves, black cap.

Don Nyhan was born in Petone, the son of Dan, a successful horse trainer from Ireland, and was raised in surrounding districts. In Wellington he met Doris, the attractive and stylish daughter of family friends who had never been to a race meeting. They were married a few years later. Within a short time Doris was driving the team in fast work while Don rose at 1.30am each day for his milk round before his day's work horse training. Even in recent years few birds were singing when Don Nyhan arrived at the stables and 8pm could count as a late night for the couple. They shifted to Canterbury in 1948, first to West Melton and later Templeton.

Visiting a client returning to England one Sunday in the late 1940s, Nyhan was offered a colt from a mare which he had trained. He later described him as "a mean-looking little coot with a poor coat who had been in swamps too long". When asked about his value he replied "nothing". Doris liked him though, and emptied her fur-coat fund to take him home for £50. The colt, Johnny Globe was to pay for a lot of fur coats, winning 34 races, an unprecedented 15 free-for-alls, and a stakes-earning record of all codes in New Zealand at a time when a Cup win could buy a farm.

His win in the 1954 NZ Cup in world record time was one of the most exciting in the long history of the race. Two years before he had pulled up as a distressed favourite. For a few dramatic minutes he hovered close to death and "you could literally see the life draining from him" an eye-witness related. An emergency high-risk dose of adrenalin restored the blood flow and within 24 hours he was back to normal. As horse stories go, Seabiscuit had nothing on Johnny Globe.

After the 1954 Cup, fans on the inside of the course rushed the track amidst unforgettable scenes of affection for the great horse. Others were cheered after big races, but only Johnny Globe was cheered and applauded before them. Partly because of his head harness, the dapper little champion appeared to nod to the public in appreciation and the natural showman soon learned the ploy for further applause.

"John" as he was known, was only not human in that he could not speak, according to Don Nyhan. Even as an older stallion he allowed children to ride him bareback without complaint, and when Doris spent up to two hours at a time bathing his troublesome feet, he would rest his head on her shoulder while she read her book. When Johnny Globe made his farewell appearance, thousands sang 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home' and club president Allan Matson expressed the hope "he will leave one as good as himself".

Retired to stud at Globe Lodge and with barely 10 mares booked to him in his first year because of a bias against New Zealand-bred stallions, he fulfilled that dream by producing Lordship, bred by Doris Nyhan. Twice winner of the NZ Cup and with 45 wins in all, he was an even greater stud success than Johnny Globe had been.

Don Nyhan trained many other top horses - all with a story - yet the father and son champions dominate memories of his achievements. He worked them hard in the old fashioned way but treated them with great respect.

A noted raconter, his stories of older days in racing never varied in the telling. He had to miss the departure of so many contemporaries in recent years but kept good health until near the end. His older son, Barry, ran the Globe Lodge breeding operation and the younger, Denis, set on the path to success by being given the drive on Lordship as a youth, was to later win his own NZ Cup with Robalan.

Don Nyhan took the one big opportunity life gave him and turned it into a small industry. That he did that without any loss to his reputation or friendships in a tough business was a true measure of his long life.

Credit: Mike Grainger writing in HRWeekly 29Oct09

 

YEAR: 2007

The passing of Doris Nyhan last week brought back memories of a truly fairytale chapter in NZ light harness history.

Doris, who had been in private care in recent years with failing sight, would have been 95 next month, but she is survived by husband of 70-odd years Don, 97, and sons Barry 70 and Denis 68. Barry's son Grant has a young daughter, but whether the Nyhan name in harness racing continues beyond the sons and daughters of Barry and Denis remains to be seen. Grant drove a bit in his younger days but is no longer actively involved in the game, while Kim is a licenceholder at Motukarara and has the maiden Spiderman racing at the moment, and Margot is well established as a trainer with partner Peter Davis, but has no children.

Whatever the future holds in that respect, the Nyhans will be forever associated with two of the greatest names to have graced the sport - Johnny Globe and Lordship. As per usual, luck played a large part in the purchase of the first, but Doris owned Lordship after borrowing the U Scott mare Ladyship from the Haslett family and breeding her to Johnny Globe, at a time when the champion pacer was hardly getting a mare in his initial years at stud.

Johnny Globe would be leading sire in NZ for four consecutive years in the early 70s however, and Lordship would continue in the same vein and make the Nyhans' Globe Lodge at Templeton an influential and successful nursery for over three decades and through the 90s. Denis drove Lordship to win 45 races including two NZ Cups before becoming a successful trainer in his own right, with another champion Robalan among others, while Barry managed Globe Lodge for much of Lordship's many years at stud.

Doris was born in Petone to German immigrants, George and Louise Hublitz. "George managed the Gear (freezing) Works at Petone, and I'd say that's where Doris got much of her business acumen from," said Denis. "She was a very well-organised and strong-willed person, and provided the structure to the partnership, which allowed Dad to concentrate on being a horseman without worrying about the peripheral concerns. She provided the backbone of the family and the whole show - she was a quiet achiever while us fellows got the limelight. Behind the scenes she could work with horses as easily as she could give us orders. When it came to raising us, fair to say she was a very no nonsense mother, but she was also very fair," he added.

Don was the son of trainer Dan Nyhan, who won the 1909 Auckland Cup with his own horse Havoc and drove the 1913 winner Jewel Chimes. As a young man Don was working hard to get ahead at Ashurst in the Manawatu in the 1930s when he met Doris and married her in 1936. They soon had two sons, and to 'make ends meet' as a horse trainer Don would get up at 1.30am and do a milk run around Lower Hutt before training the horses at Hutt Park. Doris had no experience with horses when they met, but would often also make the journey to Hutt Park, which would involve her driving the horses over a narrow bridge 'with no sides'.

Their first big break came when Pahiatua breeder F E Ward gave Nyhan a horse to train called Gold Flight. He was a son of Rey de Oro and Slapfast, a mare who had taken a yearling record in America of 2.22 1/4 in 1925 and had been imported soon after by Sir John McKenzie. Slapfast never grew and proved of little account however, and McKenzie sold her for a princely 12 guineas and she wound up with Ward, who had a bad back and needed a driving horse to get around as opposed to a motor vehicle.

After having some success with Slapfast at shows, and given her imported pedigree, Ward was encouraged to breed her to the successful sire Rey de Oro, who had moved to a Central Districts stud in his twilight years. "Gold Flight was a really good, fine looking horse and won around £3000 which was a lot of money during the war years," recalls Denis. Long-time NZ Trotting Calendar editor Karl Scott had been the agent in selling Slapfast to Ward, and subsequently held the little-known sire Sandydale on lease for a season at stud. After persuading Ward to send his mare to Sandydale, Slapfast produced a filly Sandfast which showed Nyhan a promising mile in 2.10 as as 2-year-old in 1942.

Nyhan decided she was worth putting aside to strengthen, but she got out of her paddock and into a nearby swamp, and was discovered buried in a bog up to her neck. After enlisting the help of some boys to get a rope around Sandfast she was saved, but she was never the same after the strain, and she was retired after one unforgettable race. Sandfast first had a colt by the Jack Potts horse Conflagrate, but she killed that one, before producing a colt by the supremely tough Globe Derby horse Logan Derby, who had also moved into the area to stand at stud not long after retiring from a long and grand racing career.

When Ward's wife passed away and he decided to return to his homeland of England, he offered the Logan Derby-Sandfast colt to the Nyhans. Don was not at all impressed with the pot-bellied and worm ridden weanling though, and also in the back of his mind was a desire to move his family to a new property in Canterbury. Out of sentimentality spurred by Gold Flight, Doris decided to hand over £50 she had been saving towards a fur coat, or "so the story goes, according to Don".

Intending to build the colt up with a view to selling and recouping the outlay, Don had a change of heart when he broke the colt in at 10 months and he showed him a half mile in a remarkable 66. The Nyhans had moved to Templeton by the time Johnny Globe won the 1950 Timaru Nursery 2YO Stakes, and the rest as they say is history. While troubled by his feet for much of his career, the legacy of standing around in swampy ground as a foal, Johnny Globe careered away with the NZ and Great Northern Derbys and almost tore off the NZ Cup the next season, at a time when only two other 4-year-olds had even attempted the race, some three decades prior. Johnny Globe was the leading stakewinner that season though with 8 wins and over £9000, and the stake for his close second to Van Dieman in the £7500 Cup alone was more than enough to build a good house.

Starting a hot favourite for the Cup the next year, Johnny Globe collapsed soon after the start and almost died, while the next year he was a certainty beaten when second to Adorian after losing 60 yards in an early skirmish. Having his fourth attempt as a 7-year-old in 1954, little 'Johnny' was given little chance from 48 yards with the likes of the brilliant Rupee off the front, but he would not be denied this day and returned to scenes never before or since witnessed at Addington. At the time wrote 'Ribbonwood' ..."World record pacing figures of 4.07 3/5 were returned by the indomitable dynamo of character and courage, Johnny Globe, in wrestling NZ Cup honours from Young Charles and Rupee after the most scorching and thrilling stayers' epic in harness racing the world over. And his trainer/driver, D G Nyhan, richly deserved all the compliments and congratulations showered upon him. Nyhan had come in for some trenchant criticism of his driving of Johnny Globe in some of his past races. Whether it was all merited is of no moment now. On Tuesday, Don's handling of 'Johnny' was in every sense a masterpiece: the perfect understanding and harmony between horse and driver was an inspiration."

Johnny Globe would retire as a 9-year-old as the winner of 34 races (including a record 15 FFAs) from 99 starts and £42,887, a record for a standardbred or thoroughbred raced solely in NZ. He was officially farewelled at Addington in December, 1956, when a huge crowd emotionally cheered and sang as a band played 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home'.

And as if one champion in a lifetime was not enough, not long after he sired another for the Nyhans in Lordship, who through the 60s would win two NZ Cups and rewrite many of his sire's records, including stakemoney and FFA races won. "Johnny Globe was not a very fashionably bred horse at the time - he suffered the prejudice against 'colonial-breds' even though his grandam was imported. He got four mares in his first season and sired (top 2YO and aged trotter) Au Fait and half a dozen mares in his second. But after siring Lordship and then when Adios came along, he started to earn some respect."

Sandydale was by Abbedale, the sire of Hal Dale, in turn the sire of Adios and grandsire of Meadow Skipper, while Logan Derby was by Globe Derby from a Logan Pointer mare and would sire other great pacers and trotters in spite of suffering similar prejudices at stud both here and in Australia. "He was really a horse born ahead of his time, and then you threw a U Scott mare into the picture to get Lordship, and it didn't really get any better. That's when horses were horses - I don't care what people say about the breed today."

Nyhan also recalls how easy it would have been for his Mother to sell Lordship to Australia "for colossal money" after he'd won his first race - the Welcome Stakes. There was a Captain Taylor buying up every good horse going at the time and he offered £6000, which would have been enough to buy the biggest and flashest house in Christchurch. Later there were lots of offers to go to Australia and America for that matter, but Lordship never left the country, because of her the best interests of the horse and the family came first."

Credit: Frank Marrion writing in HRWeekly 11Jul07

 

YEAR: 1948

JOHNNY GLOBE - Bargain Buy

Johnny Globe(1948) $100, 34 wins $85,375

This story has been told so often it literally has fur on it. How Don Nyhan and his wife, Doris, were visiting English expatriate breeding and saddle horse riding fan, Frank Ward, before he left to return to England. They were discussing what to do with the Ward horses in his absence. After some discussion Doris offered the $100 she had been saving for a fur coat for an unimpressive Logan Derby colt foal from Sandfast. Don went to his grave claiming he "wouldn't have given $20 for him."

It turned out to be Johnny Globe. He won 34 races(one in every three starts) and 15 Free-For-Alls(the next best in our history then, Gold Bar, won six). He retired the highest stake earner of either code raced solely in New Zealand; held four world records, and became a champion stallion. A few fur coats there! He had already made the Nyhan family fortune before he sired Lordship for Doris and he went on to break all his old man's records - a story for the ages. But was it all that it seemed?

Don entered Johnny Globe in the National Sales thinking it was the only way Doris would get her fur coat money back. Then, in what was a life changing moment, he trialled the colt over 800m on the rough old Ashhurst grass track and timed him in 1.06. Johnny Globe and the Nyhan family were headed south all right - to a West Melton stable not the sales. A pencil line went through the catalogue page.

In truth Doris Nyhan was just being practical. There was history in the stable of the family through a horse called Gold Flight, a half-brother to Sandfast. Sandfast herself had shown potential before a mishap in a bog ended her career. Johnny Globe was her first foal and apparently she hadn't done him well.

But Gold Flight had won 8 races including 3 Addington staying features for the stable and Don always maintained he was a NZ Cup horse. He died as an 8yo in tragic circumstances. The muscle powders he was treated with were banned from import to New Zealand. The Veterinary experts could find no successful replacement treatment and the old soldier just faded away

Credit: David McCarthy writing in Harnessed May 2016



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