Alec hesitated a moment. “The Black was every bit as good as we believed him to be,” he said. “We knew he had it in him, and he proved it today!”

The sportscaster then broke in and started giving the history of Alec and the Black. Jim Neville had told him the whole story.

The owners of Sun Raider and Cyclone came up and congratulated Alec. “I’ve never seen anything like him as long as I’ve been around the track,” Mr. Volence said.

“That goes for me, too!” said Mr. Hurst. “I don’t suppose you’d consider selling him?”

“No, sir,” Alec answered proudly. “You’re going to hear a lot more about this fella!”

“I’m afraid of that,” laughed Cyclone’s owner.

Answering the pleas of the hundreds grouped around them, Alec took a few roses from the huge bow of flowers draped around the Black’s neck, and then threw the rest of them into the throng. In a few seconds the souvenir hunters had ripped them apart.

The Black half-reared and old Napoleon moved closer to him. Alec smiled at Henry and his mother and father. He rubbed the Black’s nose, and then led the huge stallion through the crowd—back to his victory oats.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Walter Farley’s love for horses began when he was a small boy living in Syracuse, New York, and continued as he grew up in New York City, where his family moved. Unlike most city children, he was able to fulfill this love through an uncle who was a professional horseman. Young Walter spent much of his time with this uncle, learning about the different kinds of horse training and the people associated with them.

Walter Farley began to write his first book, The Black Stallion, while he was a student at Brooklyn’s Erasmus Hall High School and Mercersburg Academy in Pennsylvania. He eventually finished it, and it was published in 1941 while he was still an undergraduate at Columbia University.

The appearance of The Black Stallion brought such an enthusiastic response from young readers that Mr. Farley went on to create more stories about the Black, and about other horses as well. In his life he wrote a total of thirty-four books, including Man o’ War, the story of America’s greatest thoroughbred, and two photographic storybooks based on the Black Stallion movies. His books have been enormously popular in the United States and have been published in twenty-one foreign countries.

Mr. Farley and his wife, Rosemary, had four children, whom they raised on a farm in Pennsylvania and at a beach house in Florida. Horses, dogs, and cats were always a part of the household.

In 1989 Mr. Farley was honored by his hometown library in Venice, Florida, which established the Walter Farley Literary Landmark in its children’s wing. Mr. Farley died in October 1989, shortly before publication of The Young Black Stallion, the twenty-first book in the Black Stallion series. Mr. Farley co-authored The Young Black Stallion with his son, Steven.

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