Greyhounds

Greyhounds are remembered as racers, discussed as animals shaped by human purposes, and evoked by the ruin of Wonderland Greyhound Park. Their significance lies in the contrast between the track’s former attractions and its desolate remains, and in the disagreement between Lennie Seltzer’s defense of racing and Spenser’s refusal to treat breeding as a sufficient moral justification.

Racing as Memory and Business

Lennie Seltzer recalls the track with uncomplicated affection: “I miss that place,” he says, remembering how he liked to watch the dogs run and chase the rabbit. His memory joins the animals’ movement to the spectator’s enjoyment; the dogs are remembered as part of a familiar pastime, not as individuals with histories of their own. The rabbit gives the recollection its immediate focus: a pursuit that made the race watchable and helped define what Lennie misses.

His nostalgia is also economic. Lennie says the track “Lost a lot of business when those fucking PETA weirdos got riled up.” That is his account of the decline in business, not an explanation that establishes why the track ultimately ceased operating. Still, his wording makes clear that the dogs’ public meaning is contested: to him, organized opposition interfered with a place and an activity he valued; to Spenser, the dispute raises a question about what the racing asks people to accept. The dogs stand at the center of an argument in which spectatorship, commerce, and concern for animals meet without resolving into a shared view.

Breeding and Moral Purpose

When Lennie insists, “Dogs were bred to run,” he presents racing as continuous with an animal capacity. Spenser answers, “Some are bred to fight. That doesn’t mean it’s a good thing.” The comparison does not deny that dogs can run; it tests the inference Lennie draws from their breeding. A purpose imposed or encouraged by human beings, Spenser argues, does not become ethically sound simply because an animal is suited to it.

The exchange is brief, and neither man develops a general account of animal welfare. Its force comes instead from the contrast between their starting points. Lennie looks back to the pleasure of watching the race and treats the dogs’ breeding as a reason the activity makes sense. Spenser separates ability from approval, using dogfighting to show that human selection cannot settle the moral question. The animals are discussed in terms of what they do and what people have bred them to do, while the conversation asks whether those human purposes deserve acceptance.

The Track After Racing

Later, Spenser and Zebulon Sixkill enter the old grandstand. A note on a padlocked glass door reads “THANKS FOR 75 GREAT YEARS”; inside, the lower level smells of mildew and urine. Fixtures have been stripped out, but the walls still show where dozens of televisions were bolted for off-track racing. The surviving bar-and-grill sign and the red-and-white tiled floor preserve the arrangements of a venue built to keep spectators watching and wagering.

Outside, the track is muddy and overgrown with waist-high weeds. Vines cover the lower seats, and birds have nested in the rafters. Signs of recent human shelter—a small fire, boxes, and filthy rags—occupy the broken space as well. The scene does not show the dogs or explain what became of them; it shows the physical afterlife of the place where they once ran. Racing survives there as an imprint in architecture: the former viewing equipment, the track, and the grandstand remain legible even as the activity and its audience have vanished.

A Personal Winning Bet

Spenser’s own recollection complicates any simple opposition between an enthusiast and a critic. At a conversation about Rick Weinberg’s plans for Wonderland, Weinberg promises jobs, infrastructure, and a return to the original track. Spenser rejects the glamour of that description, saying Wonderland was never much of a pleasure palace, but admits to a soft spot for a greyhound named Momma’s Boy. The dog “Came in six-to-one on a twenty-buck bet” and “Kept me bucks up that week.”

That memory is precise and personal: a named dog, stated odds, a twenty-dollar wager, and a week made easier by the return. It acknowledges the attraction of betting and the economic benefit Spenser received, without making the track’s proposed revival—or racing itself—an uncomplicated good. Across Lennie’s nostalgia, Spenser’s moral distinction, and the abandoned grandstand, Greyhounds are connected to both the pleasures people remember and the human systems that give those pleasures their form.