HORSES, ROSES AND GROANING BOARDS

The first of the mint has already been picked, and it will be a miracle if there is a single sprig left growing in Louisville a week from Sunday. The silver trays and julep cups are shined, the lawns are trimmed and this weekend the Fillies will crown the Queen of the Derby at their annual ball. By Thursday of next week Bowman Field will be crowded with private planes, there will not be a vacant hotel room in town and the lobby of the Brown will spill its partying guests into the streets. Out on River Road the hostesses of Louisville are preparing once again to show Derby visitors what Southern hospitality is all about (see following pages), with cocktail parties, dances, dinners and that classic event—the Derby breakfast. The crush at the right is the Merle Robertsons' annual breakfast for more than 200 people in the heart of Louisville. The Robertson invitation, featuring the twin towers of Churchill Downs and attached to an actual horseshoe, nestles at left among the red roses that are the traditional flowers of America's sweetheart of a horse race.

Spring flowers, indoors and out, are as much a part of Louisville at Derby time as horse talk. At left, tulips frame Mrs. M. Brooks Brown at the W. G. Reynolds' Derby eve dinner dance. Mrs. Reynolds (above, in green) extends Kentucky hospitality, while a well-known trio of horsemen—Rex Ellsworth, Ray Bell and Warner Jones—discusses tomorrow's race. The garden of the W. L. Lyons Brown estate, Ashbourne (below), furnishes the mint and Mr. Brown's distilleries the other important ingredient for the juleps served at their yearly Derby Day breakfast.

At the Millard Cox party before the Derby, bourbon is in the glass and arrowheads are in the grass. These lush green acres, once Cherokee hunting grounds, are still full of Indian artifacts.

Visitors bored by days of ham and turkey flock gratefully to the home of E. G. Sutcliffe (shown greeting guests) for Sunday's beef breakfast.

SEVEN PHOTOS

RICHARD MEEK