Ken Howard was so popular that Bing Crosby, the world's great crooner, sent him a hat in the 1950s.
Crosby had a horse racing in Sydney and the Howard twang and special way of relaying equine excitement over the microphone had come to his highly tuned ear.
Howard, of course, revolutionised the theatre of race broadcasts.
One person in a million can describe a horse race well, but for the elite racing has become a stepping to more lucrative pursuits.
This was emphasised by the recent departure of Sky's Matthew Hill "to take up a position in sports commentary".
Hill was just reaching his peak, a point where brain and tongue work in unison at a hectic tempo, but others have gone elsewhere more because of the lack of opportunities than ability.
For instance, 2GB's Ray Hadley, now a weight-for-age shock jock, was promising at the races and expanded his audience, firstly in rugby league and then to the big time of morning radio.
Perhaps even more established with binoculars, Bruce McAvaney was regarded as "too good" for race broadcasts, while Ray Warren, quality in a vintage period, moved on to legendary status in rugby league.
"The Amco Cup was my launching pad into the future," Warren divulged in Andrew Webster's The Voice, published by Nero.
"Race calling was great and I enjoyed it, but I knew where I stood. In 1978, after I'd spent four years working for 2GB and calling the Amco Cup as a freelancer, Ten made me an offer to work for them full-time.
"The decision was a tough one but I accepted. I knew I had to be realistic.
"Football was taking over, and I was getting older. There were two prominent up-and-coming callers: John Tapp behind Ken Howard at 2GB, and Ian Craig behind Des Hoysted at 2UE.
"I was third in line, at best. Basically, for me to become a leading race caller, either John or Ian would have to get hit by a bus."
Howard created excitement, away from what was a drone, during his formative years under difficult circumstances.
Race clubs didn't want outside involvement and Howard often had to broadcast from the branch of a tree outside the precincts, a far cry from the air-conditioned boxes and the best seat in the house of his modern counterparts.
Still, unfettered by live telecasts, he verbally painted an attractive turf scene, and was described as the best-known man in Australia, probably bigger than the prime minister.
"He was so famous people would fall over themselves in the street just to talk to him," his mate, bookmaker Charlie Clarton, stressed in London To A Brick On by Steve Cairns.
("London to a brick on" was the declaration Howard would make regarding his confidence in a close finish, part of his dramatic dialogue.)
"Wherever we went Ken never had to put his hand into his pocket, everything was free."
However, he was versatile also calling boxing, wrestling, trots and even doing the news in the early days of Channel Nine in Sydney.
Bill Collins, tagged "The Accurate One", came later and had a bigger repertoire than Howard, singing, dancing and appearing on Channel Seven comedy skits in Melbourne.
Fortunately Mark Shean, the TVN and racecourse announcer, doesn't dabble in song and dance but rates with the best and most correct where it matters.
Being satirical, I held him to ridicule for calling a horse during the race having bitten its tongue producing blood around the 800 metres when it actually lost a "molar", a significant word in race calling since the Howard chant, regarding a horse pulling hard, having its "molars bared to the breeze".
The only way Shean will be lost to racing is if he gets an opportunity to call a grand final featuring the mighty Rabbits. And that's the team, not Warren.
Gelding note: My reincarnation fantasy of returning as a gelding last week caused considerable consternation, particularly from the shrink Dr Clive Allcock and Michael Pelly, author of The Smiler, the Murray Gleeson story.
Both felt that being direct descendants of Hyperion, in their next life they would be suitable at the stud. Alas in my current form, lacking a turn of foot and winning only a celebrity hurdle at Wentworth Park when the favourite had an asthma attack, as well as going berserk as a colt if I was ever in the same enclosure as Black Caviar, would make the gelder's blade a necessity.
Animal rights are the droppings of a bull, which brings me to Chainsaw, the great Brahman beast and rodeo performer. I would have no qualms about returning in his mould and fulfilling the tale of an old bull, me, and a young one on the mountain, overlooking cows in a nearby paddock, and what action to take.
