Sired by Bonnie Scotland, his dam was Nevada out of perhaps the most influential stallion America ever produced, the great Lexington.

Just over a decade since the American Civil War, only former officers could afford racehorses, hence the copious amount of captains associated with the horse.

Williams sold him to the Dwyer Brothers for $2,500, and the Dwyer Brothers placed him in the hands of the future Hall of Fame trainer, James G. Rowe Sr. During his first start at three, Luke lost again (to a colt named Fonso who would win the Kentucky Derby that year), but he then won twenty three of his next twenty four races, and he won them by six lengths or ten lengths or even fifteen, breaking records as he did.

McLaughlin had the mount on Hindoo, Hanover, Miss Woodford, Firenze, Kingston, George Kinney, Tremont, Tecumseh and Salvator.

[1] Luke Blackburn was sent to General William Hicks Jackson's Belle Meade Stud near Nashville, Tennessee.