Honors and Portrayals in Art, Film and Literature
In 1939, Warner Bros. released their animated take on Seabiscuit's underdog story with their Porky Pig cartoon, Porky and Teabiscuit.
In 1940, right after the spectacular Santa Anita win and at the moment of the horse's retirement, track writer B. K. Beckwith wrote Seabiscuit: The Saga of a Great Champion, with a foreword by Grantland Rice.
At Santa Anita Park, a life-sized bronze statue of Seabiscuit, hand-tooled by Frank Buchler, has been on display since 1941 - it now stands in the walking ring at the track's "Seabiscuit Court."
Another statue, although not life-sized, can be found in San Bruno at The Shops at Tanforan, a shopping mall built upon a former racetrack. Seabiscuit was stabled there briefly in 1939 while preparing for his comeback.
Businessman and racehorse owner W. Arnold Hanger donated a statuette of Seabiscuit to the Keeneland library in the 1940s.
In 1949, a fictionalized account was made into the motion picture The Story of Seabiscuit, starring Shirley Temple. Sea Sovereign played the title role. An otherwise undistinguished film, it did include actual match race footage of War Admiral.
In 1958, Seabiscuit was voted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame.
In 1963, Ralph Moody wrote Come On Seabiscuit (ISBN 0-8032-8287-7), illustrated by Robert Riger, and recently returned to print by the University of Nebraska Press.
In the Blood-Horse magazine ranking of the top 100 U.S. thoroughbred champions of the 20th Century (1999), Seabiscuit was ranked twenty-fifth. War Admiral was thirteenth, and Seabiscuit's grandsire and War Admiral's sire, Man o' War, placed first.
In 2001, Laura Hillenbrand wrote Seabiscuit: An American Legend (ISBN 0-449-00561-5). The book became a bestseller, and in 2003, Universal Studios released Seabiscuit, which was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
In 2003, Seabiscuit was the subject of a documentary that aired on the PBS television series American Experience.
In 2009, after an 8-year-long grassroots effort by Maggie Van Ostrand and Chuck Lustick, Seabiscuit was honored by the United States Postal Service with a stamp bearing his likeness. Thousands of signatures were obtained from all over the nation, and the final approval was given by Citizens Stamp Committee member Joan Mondale, wife of former Vice President Walter Mondale.
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