At age 74 BOB MURPHY is still the largest owner of Standardbreds in Canada, albeit with one-half the number he once had. In the world of commerce he’s an open class performer and has brought that insight to the group set to build the new Calgary racetrack. By Todd Beelby • Photos by Paul vanPeenen

No Laying Down On The Job Robert Murphy has been there, done that and earned a few t-shirts along the way. Starting out with basically nothing at a hot dog stand in Kelowna, BC, Bob worked extremely hard for over 60 years and is now one of the wealthiest men in British Columbia. Never afraid of taking a chance, Murphy owns a few different businesses, one being his Serta mattress manufacturing plant and another called Advance Wire Products, which are both exceptionally successful. He also built and operated two exclusive fishing resorts in BC one of which he still co-owns and thoroughly enjoys. Not one to sit still, Bob entered the harness racing industry 27 years ago, and at one point owned over 400 horses. Most racing followers are familiar with the “Red Star” prefix that Murphy uses for all of his homebreds, but not many people outside of British Columbia have had the pleasure of meeting Bob or even know what he looks like. That changed somewhat last year when he was nominated for an O’Brien Award as Breeder of the Year. Bob and his wife of 55 years, Mary, have three daughters, Denise, Linda and Sharon, all of whom have worked in the family’s Standardbred operation in some capacity over the years. Several years ago Todd Beelby was Murphy’s Alberta trainer. His brother Brent has been the Farm Manager in Surrey for Murphy for five years now. Two months ago Todd visited his former owner and long time friend to provide the following story for our readers.

NO LAYING DOWN ON THE JOB

Where are you from originally? I was born in Vancouver, British Columbia. My Dad worked right in Vancouver as a Grader at the Sawmill. Do you come from a large family? No, I just have one brother, Chuck. How far did you go in school? I am a high school graduate. What was your first job? I used to leave Vancouver in the summer and go to Kelowna, BC and work at the Kelowna Regatta. It is a big summer festival and I worked at a hot dog stand. Before long I decided I wanted to work on my own, which has always been my nature, so I opened up my own hot dog stand. The fellow I had worked for was a great guy, and I worked really hard for him, all hours of the day. We did lots of travelling as well with the show and would be up pretty much all night long and then back early again in the morning. There were four counters and I used to sleep under the main counter with my sleeping bag, so I was really quite attached to it. He liked what I was doing, how hardworking I was, and I made lots of money for him. I always talked about how I wanted my own stand. He had a spare one and one day said, ‘If you want it, take it.’ I did quite well with it. I always liked onions, and the other three or four hot dog stands all fried their onions, but I decided to steam mine. I used to load it up with onions and the smell of the steamed onions would keep my lineup two to three deep constantly. What year was that? That was 1952, the year Mary and I got married. I was 20 years old. We just recently celebrated our 55th wedding anniversary. What did you do after the hot dog stand? At the same time I was also working for a lumber wholesaler at a store they had in Calgary. After a while I decided I wanted to have my own store. So I opened up a carpet and linoleum store with my partner Pat Logan, called Logan Murphy. He was an older man, I would sell, and he would go out and do the installations. Eventually, I decided I wanted to move back to BC and open up my own business. Once I got back here, Sears was opening up their first store out in Burnaby. They were advertising for managers so I applied and got the job. I was transferred all over Canada with various positions. Finally we got to the stage where we had lived in all parts of Canada, a lot of them in the East where the head offices were. I became the Western Merchandise Manager, and from there I was offered a job in Toronto to head up the Home Furnishing Division but it meant we would have to go back there and live.

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I wanted to remain in BC so I had a decision to make. One of the positions I had held was furniture buyer and I got to know quite a bit about the manufacturing end of it, who was successful at it and who wasn’t. I decided to come home and start up my own factory. It was typical of me. I packed it up, had my wife’s support, and gave up a real good opportunity, a real key executive job with them. The money was good, as was the security but I still had that yearning to be on my own and do my own thing. So we came back and started up the mattress business. Was it Serta right from the beginning? No, originally it was Restonic. I had made some good friends and contacts from my buying days, and when a Restonic franchise became available in BC, these chaps from Toronto, who had befriended me, offered to back me. That wasn’t what I wanted so I scraped together whatever I could and ended up starting my own business. That was in 1957 and we started with six employees. Today it is Serta and we are up over 200 employees. Are you the number one Serta manufacturer in Canada? Yes we would be nationally. You own another company named Advance Wire Products. How did you get involved in this company? One of the main component parts for making mattresses is wire for springs and I decided we should be making our own.

There was an outfit that a couple of brothers had owned for a few years and they were into display materials like book racks in Safeway stores. They were ready to retire, one had had a heart attack and the other one just wanted to get out. I hired their foreman and bought the business from the brothers and started in the wire business. Now we are definitely one of the largest suppliers in the whole Northwest, as a matter of fact we also supply into Hawaii. We are into large supermarkets with our biggest customer being Safeway and all of their affiliates that they have in the States, we do all of their work. We just built a new building here in Surrey and this company has about 90 employees. You used to own the Queen Charlotte Lodge on the Queen Charlotte Islands, an exclusive and remote fishing resort. How did that come about? I’m an ardent fisherman, always have been, and that was one of the reasons I wanted to be back on the coast. I used to do a lot of boating and fishing near Prince Rupert on the northern coast. One of my trips up there to the Charlottes was to a place called Naden Harbour, it is about 35 miles from the tip of Alaska. It’s beautiful fishing country and I have always wanted to have my own little hideaway. The fishing up there is great and I loved the whole remoteness of it. I decided I should build a lodge there. Originally I was just going to build a small cabin that I could take my corporate customers to in small groups. So I bought the property which was the only privately owned piece of property in that whole northern part of the Queen Charlottes. How many acres was it? There were 20 acres. Actually I bought it sight unseen. I went in thinking I would build a cabin that could hold about a dozen people and I ended up building a 19,000 square foot resort that held about 120 guests at a time. I sold it about 10 years ago.

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Photo by N e w Image M edia

NO LAYING DOWN ON THE JOB

One of Bob Murphy's most successful homebreds has been the Grinfromeartoear daughter Red Star Biggirl. The filly started her career in BC, shifted to Alberta and then Ontario and never lost a beat. She did not miss a cheque last season as a sophomore and had standings of 8-4-2 in 15 starts for $318,000 in earnings. It must have been quite the production building the lodge given its remote location. There was no Home Depot right across the street. Everything had to be barged or flown in, mostly barged. There was just no place where you could buy building materials. It was all brought in from Prince Rupert across the Sound to our location in Naden Harbour. It was really quite the experience; I had no idea what I was getting into. Except that you couldn’t stop once you got started. Yes, once that first load of logs went in that was it. That was an experience in itself. Not only did they not have any local suppliers, there was no labour either. What was the size of the crew you had building the lodge? When we were going at our peak we had a hundred people up there. I was very fortunate to get the crew I did. They were all from the same community and when they went up there they went with their total family, Mother, Father, Grandpa, Grandma, baby, etc. The whole family from morning to night was on that site. Young kids were carrying lumber, pounding nails, mixing cement and doing the whole thing. We started in March and actually opened in

the middle of June; in three months we had that built, you just wouldn’t have believed it. One of the things I always said was that if I built something like that I wanted to do it first class. I wanted to look at it as my own home, take my shoes off at night and feel comfortable with what I’m standing on. So the one thing I said to my suppliers was I wanted first class materials and I wanted this to be a first class lodge. I wasn’t going to quibble over the costs of it but I wanted the workmanship and the materials to be the best. That was the one real standard and directive that I gave and as a result it ended up that way. During the time it was being built there was a lot of friction between the sports fishermen in that area and the Haida Nation. They had the feeling it was their territory and the sports fishermen were infringing on their area; there was a lot of controversy going on at that time. I went to a council meeting in Massett, where their town was. By boat it is about half an hour away. They really gave me a rough time. My attitude was here I’m putting this together, it is employment for you, you will be proud of it and by doing this we will be working together and all mutually benefit from it.

NO LAYING DOWN ON THE JOB They saw my logic so at the time when everyone else was having their troubles with them we bonded and formed a fairly close relationship. When we opened the lodge they had a ceremony. There are eight tribes in the area, they all came to the lodge and they gave it a Haida name. Even the Minister of Tourism came to the opening; there was all kinds of press coverage. We invited the entire town of Massett, which holds approximately 1,500 people, to the new lodge. We hired the Hereditary Chief, and we were going to make him the lodge manager but he didn’t have enough experience so he became the assistant lodge manager. By the time that we got the lodge open and the guests started to come in, everybody, literally everybody in that town of Massett had our t-shirt. The whole town was supporting us, it worked out very well. Why did you sell it? Well, it wasn’t for sale. We would get a lot of large corporations there as well as a lot of Hollywood types, the likes of Lee Iacocca, the movie colony, the sports people. (Former NHL star) Mark Messier used to bring a crew up there. Groups like Honeywell would come and take up the whole lodge. I had a number of different people who wanted to buy it and I always turned everybody down. Finally though the timing was right. I was getting busier and busier with all the projects

I had going at the time and I could no longer devote the time and energy to it, so I sold it. You took a few years off from owning a resort and then you built Gowlland Harbour Resort And Conference Centre, on Quadra Island, tell us about that. It is a lodge I finished about three years ago. It is totally opposite in terms of environment and the conditions, it is more laid back. The Queen Charlotte Lodge was very busy and hectic at times. This one is quieter. Do you and Mary get there often? Yes, we like it there because the weather and the water are nicer and it is just so serene. I have had a place up there for 17 years; it’s not new to us. How do you get there? Either by plane or boat. You can drive to Campbell River and then take a small ferry across to Quadra Island. From here (White Rock) driving to the lodge takes about four hours. To fly from here it takes about an hour and a half. You fly into Campbell River and then take the ferry across. It really is first class as well. It holds about 40 people and the season is a lot longer. It could be year round, but we don’t operate it that way. It has a couple of nice lodges on it, the main lodge holds 18 guests, then there are two lodges that take eight each and one smaller private lodge that we stay at when we go or for my special friends. Let’s talk horses now. How did that interest start? Years ago I had a good friend who was into the Thoroughbreds, Frank Gatter. He loved racing and talked us into going, and we ended up owning six of them over a period of about five years. One Friday night they said we should go to Cloverdale (now Fraser Downs), they had a great smorgasbord and we have been there ever since. What year was that? 1980. The difference for me between the Thoroughbreds and Standardbreds was how close you can be to harness racing, you have more of a feel, you can be part of it. With Thoroughbreds if you want to talk to your trainer it was at 5:30 in the morning and that just wasn’t for me. Once we went to the harness races I thought it was something I could really get into. Frank suggested that Rick White would be a really good trainer for me. I took his advice, and at a later date I walked into Rick’s barn looking for him. I introduced myself and told him I wanted to claim a horse. Rick told me it was going to cost me at least $2,500, they had $2,500 claimers back then. I said no, I wanted to claim a good horse. In the interim, I had heard about a good horse for sale named Holridge Joe, so I couldn’t wait to get to Rick. I said ‘I understand there is a horse for sale named Holridge Joe and I want to buy him.’ He kind of gave me a strange look and said ‘that’s a lot of money.’ I said ‘well, I want to buy him.’ Rick had

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NO LAYING DOWN ON THE JOB another owner who was interested as well and he ended up buying him. That teed me off right off the bat. Frank went to see Rick and told him I wasn’t very happy about it and Rick said, ‘he doesn’t have much money does he? You are his boss aren’t you?’ Frank said ‘heck no!’ We joked about that for years. Rick claimed my first horse, Bethany Pegasus, for about $12,000 if I remember correctly, but I never really got over the Holridge Joe thing. That was the first horse, so typical me, I was not satisfied with one horse, all of a sudden I wanted to buy a farm with a track on it and get behind this horse, because I had heard you were able to go out and get in the jogcart. So I bought a farm with a little sawdust track on it and as soon as I bought that I needed some broodmares to breed a couple. It wasn’t long before we had about a dozen horses there, and four or five employees including Joe Sonier who is still working for me. Then in about 1984 it just mushroomed. How many horses did you have at the peak? We got up to 400 horses at one point but I decided a few years ago I needed to cut down. To what number? We have about 220 horses now, 46 of those are broodmares. Quite frankly I am losing interest in it all, it’s just not as fun anymore. I would like to one day just have a few really good horses. You have some horses in the east as well, how is that going? Bob Merschback is back east now and I have 10 or 12 horses there, plus Mark Harder has been doing quite well at the Meadowlands for me. If you open up any program across Canada you will find a few Red Star horses in it with an incredible number of them at Fraser Downs. Where did that prefix come from? Rick White. His colors were white on the shoulders with the red stars on it. When I originally did that it was a bit controversial, it was when the Cold War

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was going on some people said I was a Russian agent or what have you. Do you name all of the horses? In the beginning I named them, but now my daughter Denise does. I used to name a lot of them after family members or friends, but only one of them really turned out, Red Star Kelsey, named after your (Todd’s) daughter, she was a real nice mare. For the most part, naming after people I knew didn’t work out. You have two farms in BC, one for broodmares and babies, and the training centre in Surrey. Tell us a little about them. The farm just south of Kelowna is actually three farms side by side, 145 acres. That is where I keep all of the broodmares and babies. The farm in Surrey is 90 acres, it has a track on it and three barns for training the yearlings and racehorses. You have a large interest in the track currently under construction in Calgary along with six Thoroughbred people. How is it coming along? We had a bit of a setback with the water situation, all of a sudden they put a moratorium on the Bow River, so we had to look for another source, but that is solved now. It has been tough breaking ground this winter with all the cold and snow, so all that was done was some clearing. It looks like it will be ready for the fall of 2008. There will be a 1,400,000 square foot shopping mall, a hotel and a racetrack for both breeds. It will be an extremely nice facility, benefiting the racing community mostly. A first class track, a nice dormitory, an area to park trailers for the horseman and all the other amenities. So it is all privately owned by you seven? Yes. We may decide to bring in some more shareholders because we are talking some big numbers here. In fact that is a real possibility. When the whole complex is finished, it will be over a billion dollars.

Sandown Park on Vancouver Island has stated they are not racing this summer, how big of a blow is that to the industry in BC? That is a huge blow to the racing industry. We have to solve it by having a longer racing season at Fraser to give horseman the opportunity to put some money ahead before the layoff. We can’t do it based on what is planned now and it is really bad if you have a top horse, you just can’t get them raced or if you do it is every second or third week and then you are handicapped with an outside post. As good as your horses are you can’t be racing them under those conditions. There is no encouragement to get better horses out here, and if you do, you just end up shipping them away again. I got into the game here because I enjoy watching them, enjoy having them around, and enjoy going over to the barns. You used to be around the barn quite a bit, are you still as involved? Not nearly as involved as I once was. I used be down there all the time as your brother Brent will tell you, but now I only go once a week. Do you have any involvement in classifying your racehorses or do you leave that up to your trainers? No, I leave that all up to them, unless they ask for my opinion. Where do you see your operation five years from now? It is hard to say, it is heading to all $4,000 claimers here and I am not a $4,000 claimer guy. I do have them, I never used to have them, that was a giveaway for me, but now I have to. To make any money here you need to race the $4,000 to $6,000 claimers. So where I will be in five years here, quite frankly, a lot will depend on Alberta, but I think as far as BC is concerned, I probably won’t be on the scene. If I am, it will be with very few horses. What I may do is get a farm in Alberta. I may start spending a lot more time out there, so perhaps I’ll buy

NO LAYING DOWN ON THE JOB a farm with a track on it. But five years from now, the way I am feeling, who knows? It’s not pleasant and it gets to you. What keeps you in the game? I feel for my people. I have had a lot of people working for me for a long time, and I hate like hell to let them down. That’s what keeps me going. So is it tough to be optimistic at all about the future of racing here in BC? Yes it is. I think the future is brighter in Alberta with the new racetrack. It should bring in a lot better horses there to race then it is up to track management to promote it and get races for better horses. What do you think about the future of racing in Canada? It’s good; I think there is a good future ahead for racing. You were nominated this year for an O’Brien award for Breeder of the Year,

that had to be a great feeling. It was really quite an honour. It certainly was a surprise; here I am with my operation out west competing against Seelster Farms. It really made me feel proud even though we didn’t win. What has been your most memorable moment in racing? Well I have had a few of them including Red Star Kelsey winning the Northlands Filly Pace. The combination of her being named after your daughter, and knowing Kelsey what she has had to go through with diabetes, that was a big thrill. That was for sure the most exciting event in my career as far as racing. (Kelsey Beelby’s fight against diabetes and the Alberta horse community’s support of that cause was detailed in our December 2003 issue.) Direct Quote winning the Four Leaf Clover Series at the Meadowlands was another one, that was my first major stake win, but definitely the Kelsey

experience was a good time, it really sticks out. We have won a number of stake races with our young horses and every time you get one that you have raised winning a stake final, that is always a big thrill. The results we get out of the breeding end of it is a big part for me being involved in the sport. A claimer is a claimer, but getting one you have raised winning a major stake race is far more enjoyable. In addition to raising and racing top horses you also claim to being the greatest cribbage player ever, is it mostly luck in your case? Well that’s for sure, I don’t practice very much, it’s just a lot of intellect, sharpness, quickness on the draw, and quite frankly playing people who are not quite as good. The interview concluded with a few rounds of cribbage with Murphy eventually winning game seven according to Beelby. !

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