Racing Calendar is the official horseracing publication of the Jockey Club.
Its first predecessor came when John Cheny (fl.1727-1750) published the first calendar in 1727, titled An Historical List of Horse-Matches Run,[1] and maintained annual publication until his death in 1750.[2] Reginald Heber took over publication in 1751, with his final volume being published in 1768. Benjamin Walker kept the publication going for two more years.[3] Several other competing calendars appeared after Cheny's death, by various publishers,[4] including John Pond's Sporting Kalendar, published 1751-1757, and William Tuting and Thomas Fawconer's The Sporting Calendar, published until 1772.[3]
In 1773, James Weatherby, who in 1770 had been appointed at Keeper of the Math Book for the Jockey Club, began publishing the Racing Calendar.[4][5] His nephew, also James Weatherby, helped with the publishing, establishing the family business of Weatherbys,[3] which continued to own and publish the calendar until 1902 when the Jockey Club finally purchased it.[6]
^Wray Vamplew, ‘Cheny, John (fl. 1727–1750)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 8 February 2023
^ abcBinns, Matthew; Morris, Tony (2010). Thoroughbred Breeding: Pedigree Theories and the Science of Genetics. J.A. Allen an imprint of the Crowood Press. ISBN9780851319353.
