from the United States Harness Writers Association

Goshen, NY — Chris Tully, the president of the United States Harness Writers Association, has appointed 58-year-old Robert “Hollywood” Heyden to be the newest member of the Hall of Fame Screening Committee to serve a six-year term.

More than looking forward to the task, Heyden himself was elected to the Communicators Hall of Fame in 2012.

Photo courtesy of USHWA

Robert “Hollywood” Heyden is the newest member of the Hall of Fame Screening Committee.

The ‘Statistician to the Stars’ exclaimed, “This is great. I follow everything closely and forget nothing. I have a real good idea who should and who shouldn’t be a serious candidate to the Hall of Fame. But regardless, I think it is wonderful for people to be involved, to talk about it, to wonder, to speculate, to compare numbers with those that are in, etc.

“The conversation that starts and ends with the Harness Racing Hall of Fame in Goshen is all good. I welcome anyone and everyone who has an opinion, a case, a say, anything concerning the Hall of Fame. I really do. But everyone has to remember the most important thing — the Hall of Fame is the highest honor — and is ultra-special. Only the very elite merit consideration. Joe DiMaggio was voted baseball’s greatest living player in 1969, yet he did not make the Baseball Hall of Fame his first two years of eligibility.”

Heyden, a Rutgers 1978 graduate and a Meadowlands employee for 27 years under the NJSEA, still does the TV show there, usually on Saturdays.

“The Meadowlands has had a bigger role in shaping the industry than any other track in the past 35 years. Maybe any track ever. So if you have proven you can do it there, it matters — big time. Many have tried and went home. The survival of the fittest for sure. A huge part of the reason Campbell and O’Donnell went in together in 1990 is that they had shared the last 10 Meadowlands driving titles going into that year. Of course they were great anywhere, but many of their highlight moments were there.”

A big fan of the history of the sport, Heyden likes to quote Angela Lansbury when it comes to getting a bit older. “She said, ‘there weren’t many good things about getting older — but one was the fact that you then had this vast reservoir of knowledge from which to draw upon.’”

Heyden is considering writing a book in conjunction with the 40th anniversary of the Meadowlands Sept. 1, 2016. He has a carload of goodies from all his years at the Big M.