LouLife

The concept of “lengthening” the Derby - so out-of-towners (and their wallets) might be persuaded to ext/files/storyimages/their stay in Louisville before Thoroughbred racing’s biggest day - was actually born 80 years ago, not 50. From 1935-‘37, the city staged a concert, fireworks show, boxing matches and a Friday-night parade down Fourth Street as part of the original Derby Festival, halted abruptly in its third year by social and financial repercussions of the devastating ‘37 Flood.

Resurrected 19 years later, the 1956 Kentucky Derby Festival used its $640 budget (of which $191 went unspent) to hold just one event - the 35-float, 23-band inaugural Pegasus Parade, which ran west to east on Broadway and then north on Fourth Street, starting at 8 p.m. - but would grow into today’s three-week-long, 70-event colossus that entertains 1.5 million people yearly and runs on 4,000 volunteers and a $5.2 million budget.

Here’s a brief timeline on how the Derby Festival evolved:

- The They’re Off Luncheon, first held at downtown’s Jefferson County Armory (now the Gardens of Louisville), and the Coronation Ball (which became the Fillies Derby Ball two years later) were added in 1957.

- The Great Steamboat Race was added in 1963, the year after County Judge Marlow Cook purchased the nearly scrapped Avalon (christened the Idlewild in 1914 and renamed by Cook the Belle of Louisville) for $34,000.

- The Derby Chow Wagon, originally called the Chuck Wagon, made its first appearance in 1972, during the seven-year reign of Festival director Jack Guthrie. Subsequent Guthrie-fostered events included the introduction of the Pegasus Pin (1973), whose sale now accounts for 22 percent of the Derby Festival’s budget; the Great Balloon Race (1973), initially launched at Iroquois Park; the Basketball Classic (1973), featuring the nation’s top high school seniors; the miniMarathon (1974), whose first participants totaled 301 (there are now roughly 25 times that number); and the Derby Festival Foundation’s Pro-Am Golf Tournament (1974).

-  Other key years for Festival event start-ups were 1979 (Run for the RosZ), 1981 (Poster Party), 1987 (Parade Preview), 1989 (Volley-ball Classic, the largest outdoor tournament in the U.S), 1990 (Great Bed Races, Spring Fashion Show, $1 Million Hole-in-One Golf Contest and Thunder Over Louisville) and 1993 (Great Balloon Glow). Thunder, of course, which was staged out at the Fairgrounds its first year, now overshadows all of the other Festival events. Enthralling 600,000 military-aircraft junkies and fireworks fans on both sides of the Ohio will do that for you.

As will selling all those hotdogs, beers and funnel cakes.