American Pharoah will stand for an unchanged fee of ¥4 million at the Japan Bloodhorse Breeders' Association's Shizunai Stallion Station in 2027, following a successful first season at the stud.

Not so long ago, heroic public statuary felt irrelevant—good for locating yourself in traffic circles but otherwise dismissed as a relic of some credulous, great-man-besotted past. The fact that ...