Sir Stanley William Clarke, CBE, DL (7 June 1933 – 19 September 2004) was an English businessman, property developer, horse racing enthusiast, and philanthropist.

The farmer agreed to waive the purchase price of £125 until Clarke had gained planning permission, which he duly did and sold the land ownwards for £650 before paying for it.

[6] In the 1980s the company developed the 1986 Stoke-on-Trent Garden Festival site,[6] Burton's Octagon Shopping Centre, the Britannia Stadium,[4] and the Concorde Business Park near Manchester Airport.

They could never understand what we were doing, those City boys.After this time the company began to concentrate on the development of brownfield sites as shopping centres, office buildings and industrial estates.

[2] Clarke concentrated on breeding stock, and with his wife initially featured prominently on the point-to-point circuit, with good horses such as Mount Argus and Captain Frisk.

He stabled a number of horses with Somerset-based Martin Pipe, who trained Rolling Ball, the Royal and SunAlliance Chase winner at Cheltenham racecourse in 1991.

[3] The high point came in 1997, when his New Zealand-bred gelding Lord Gyllene (born 10 November 1988), trained by Steve Brookshaw and ridden by Tony Dobbin, won the 1997 Grand National at Aintree racecourse.

[8] The victory of Lord Gyllene is remembered as much for the circumstances surrounding the bomb threats and re-staging of the Grand National on the following Monday, as for his win itself.

[3][4] The development of Uttoxeter formed the business model for Clarke's later seven purchases, each with a distinctive green and white livery as part of a re-branding that concentrated hugely on their having a "spotless" appearance.

After buying Newcastle Racecourse, Clarke appeared on the first race day in the Silver Ring, mounted a soap box and addressed the crowd.

[1] Installing himself as Executive chairman, one of his daughters as a director and his son as CEO, he reversed his existing seven other racecourses into the listed entity, renaming it Northern Racing plc.

At the time of his death, Clarke was chairing an appeal to raise £2.5 million to restore the 16th-century Flemish Herkenrode glass in seven of Lichfield Cathedral's windows.

Although that to the Queen's Hospital Cancer Appeal is known,[4] the majority of their donations, running into millions of pounds, were always made on the understanding that they should remain anonymous.

[1][2] In 1997 the couple bought Dunstall Hall for £4.5 million, a house set in 1,260 acres (510 ha) of land adjoining their existing estate at Barton-under-Needwood.

[3] Investing in the restoration of the Hall and grounds, which feature in a dedicated programme on Channel Five,[4] the plan was to sustain its upkeep by turning it ito a conference, banqueting and wedding venue.

[4] The family also used it for entertaining, where Clarke would put on charity and celebratory events, engaging artistes including Acker Bilk, Ken Dodd, Ronnie Corbett and Paul Daniels.