Today, May 28, is significant for greyhound racing because on this day in 1927 the first race meeting staged behind a mechanical lure was held at Glebe's Epping Racecourse, later to be re-named Harold Park.
An advertisement in the Sydney Morning Herald on May 28, 1927, declared greyhound racing to be "the sport for the masses.''
The mechanical lure had been created by an American, O. P. Smith, who set up a miniature racetrack at the 1908 Chicago World Fair to promote his new invention.
Another American, "Judge'' Frederick Swindell, launched greyhound racing behind Smith's mechanical lure in Florida in 1921.
There, Jack Munro, a talent scout for Sydney's Stadiums Limited, saw the concept and believed it could be a hit in Australia.
Munro had been in the US recruiting boxing talent for his boss, Hugh "Huge Deal'' McIntosh, and six years later Australia's first greyhound races were held in Glebe.
The crude starting boxes at that initial meeting saw the greyhounds leap onto a grass track 15cm below the edge of the traps.
Bellamaud won the first race and crowds at Epping, re-named two years later after Childe Harold, a famous pacer, were soon averaging 18,000 per meeting.
