Museum Treasure of the Month - May
Ras Prince Monolulu's Jackets
On display in You Bet! The History of Betting Gallery.
Gift: The Friends of the National Horseracing Museum
Ras Prince Monolulu came to Britain in the early 1900s and was something of an institution on British racecourses by the 1920s and for the next few decades. He claimed to be a chief of the Falasha tribe of Abyssinia but in fact he was born in 1881 in St Croix, Danish West Indies (now US Virgin Islands).
Monolulu cut an unmistakable figure with his baggy trousers, colourful jackets, ostrich-feathered head dress and his trademark cry of 'I gotta horse!' He frequently featured in newsreel broadscasts, and as a consequence was an early media celebrity and probably the most well known ethnic person in Britain at that time.
It is said that Monolulu tipped and backed Spion Kop in the 1920 Derby and when the horse won at odds of 100-6 he personally won £8,000 which was a considerable fortune at that time.
The National Horseracing Museum contributed towards BBC Radio Suffolk's regional A History of the World series through a feature on Prince Monolulu's jackets.