Wed May 07 2003 at 16:20:22
Saratoga Springs, New York is located in Saratoga County, and is located at 43.07° north and 73.78° west. It has a current population of about 27000.
The name Saratoga originates from the Mohawk tribe of the Iroquois Confederacy, thought there are several interpretations. It comes from the word Se-rach-ta-gue meant the hillside country of the quiet river. The first settlers arrived in the area around Saratoga Springs in 1688. In 1702, Johannes Schuyler came to the area, and organized sawmills and farms in the area around Fish Creek. He invited people from Albany to come and work for him, going so far as to build fortifications to protect the settlements from raiding parties, resulting in the construction of Fort Saratoga. By the mid 1700 s, the area around the fort had 30 dwellings and many small industries.
John Morrissey By Liz O Connell, Contributor
As Saratoga Springs celebrates 150 years of thoroughbred racing, Liz O’Connell tells the tale of John Morrissey, an Irish immigrant who organized, operated and had the vision to develop what is now one of the world’s greatest racecourses.
A scant month after the Confederate Army was pushed back at Gettysburg, the “swells” holidaying in Saratoga Springs, New York, flocked to the first thoroughbred race meet contested on the Union Avenue trotting track. It was August 1863 and the meet lasted four days.
One hundred fifty years later, hundreds of thousands of fans trek annually to the peerless Saratoga Race Course, across the road from the site of those first races, for six weeks of the finest racing in America.