Clock still winding down on Hawthorne bankruptcy and closure
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CHICAGO -- The Wednesday continuation of a Monday federal court hearing regarding Hawthorne Race Course’s bankruptcy did not yield any official action, but it seems more a matter of when and how than if the sale of the Hawthorne property to the Delaware-based Allimac LLC will go through.
Attorneys still are hashing out details of Allimac’s $90 million purchase offer, which, apparently, would see the Hawthorne grandstand and stables demolished to make way for some sort of commercial development. Another hearing is scheduled for Friday morning.
Allimac was formed in late June, not long before submitting a purchase bid to the federal bankruptcy court in Chicago. There appears to be no public information regarding Allimac’s principals or aims.
About 500 horses and 500 people still were housed on the Hawthorne backstretch this week, and consideration for their well-being is among the issues yet to be resolved. On Monday, some assurances were given that neither humans nor animals would be forced off the 108-acre property before Aug. 31, but that is not guaranteed.
Hawthorne, the last racetrack in northern Illinois, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in late February and reportedly has debts greater than the purchase offer. It’s possible that Hawthorne’s bankruptcy could be converted from Chapter 11, which focuses on reorganizing debt, to Chapter 7, a liquidation process that can come into effect when a debtor lacks funds to administer bankruptcy proceedings. A move to Chapter 7 could radically expedite the sale’s closing and require the backstretch to be vacated.
The Illinois Gaming Board approved Hawthorne for a casino license some seven years ago, but the track, owned for more than a century by the Carey family, could not muster the financial wherewithal to move the project forward. The track’s financial condition and position within the regional racing circuit steadily diminished, and grave concern over the viability of a Hawthorne Thoroughbred meeting arose during the winter of 2025. The Illinois Racing Board this past winter briefly suspended Hawthorne’s license to conduct Standardbred racing after Hawthorne’s checks began bouncing, but Hawthorne, even into this summer, continued insisting they would find a partner to help finance a casino and save the venue.
Hawthorne almost certainly ran its final races on Sunday, July 19. Purses have not been paid for that card or the two that preceded it, on July 5 and July 12, and the ongoing hearing will determine how funds will be distributed to horsemen and everyone else owed money by Hawthorne.
Fairmount Park on the Illinois side of St. Louis remains a going concern, but this could be the end of Chicago racing, once a continental hub of the sport.
Sportsman’s Park, which sat on property adjacent to Hawthorne, hosted its last races in 2002 after a disastrous conversion to a dual-use horse- and auto-racing facility. In 2015, Maywood Park and Balmoral Park, Chicagoland’s two harness tracks, both closed. Balmoral, in the southwest suburb of Crete, held a Thoroughbred meet through 1990. Churchill Downs Inc. closed Arlington Park, the crown jewel of Chicago racing, in 2021 and sold the property to the Chicago Bears.
That left wobbly Hawthorne as the last track standing, and now it, too, is falling.
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