Eddie Sweat
Edward Sweat (August 29, 1939 – April 17, 1998) was an American groom in Thoroughbred horse racing who was the subject of the 2006 book by Lawrence Scanlan titled The Horse God Built: Secretariat, His Groom, Their Legacy. Career Born in Holly Hill, South Carolina, Eddie Sweat was one of nine children of a sharecropper. Holly Hill was where future U.S. Racing Hall of Fame trainer Lucien Laurin maintained a Thoroughbred horse farm. Laurin offered Sweat a job after he saw the wide-eyed teen frequently peeking at the horses through a fence to the property. In 1957, at age eighteen, Sweat accepted the offer of full-time work as groom for the Laurin stable of racehorses with a small fixed salary plus 1% of the horse's earnings. One of the first highly successful horses placed in Sweat's care was the 1958 American Champion Two-Year-Old Filly Quill. In 1966, Sweat was part of the Laurin stables' first American Classic win when Amberoid captured the Belmont Stakes. Six years later, Sweat gained national media attention for his abilities in handling Thoroughbreds when sportswriter William Nack spent many hours with him during 1972 and 1973 outside the Laurin stable stalls of Kentucky Derby winner