Born in London, England, in 1841, he arrived at Lyttelton on 1 August 1866. Shortly after he joined the staff of the Union Bank of Australia in Christchurch and then in 1870 he joined William Royse in a grain exporting business called Royse, Stead & Company, when Royse retired George carried on the business. Circa 1895 he was trading as a grain merchant under the name George G Stead & Company, which he carried on until 1903. He was the director of many companies, the founder or co-founder of some & proprietor of many others including The Press.

Although a shrewd, knowledgeable, and hard-bargaining grain merchant, George’s principal ambition was to use his profits to establish himself in his hobby of horseracing. In 1868 he was handicapper for the Amuri Racing Club and began writing racing notes for the Lyttelton Times, he also acted as honorary handicapper for the Leithfield races in 1873 and Canterbury Jockey Club in 1875 and on other occasions.

He joined the Canterbury Jockey Club in 1872 & became the club’s honorary treasurer in 1873, a position he held continuously until he died in 1908, at the time the CJC was the most successful in NZ. He was elected chairman of the club on 7 June 1902, a position he held until 5 March 1907.

He was active in the formation of the NZ Racing Conference and setting up a uniform set of racing rules for the country & was among those responsible for introducing the totalisator at Riccarton in 1880, the first in NZ. In 1876, after returning from a trip to Australia, he introduced the race book to NZ racing.

In 1875 he purchased half of Henry Redwood’s racing stud and his debut as an owner took place in 1877 when Trump Card won the Canterbury Derby. For his first decade in racing, he used the assumed name of G. Fraser (a common practice at the time).

The yellow jacket & black cap were registered as George’s racing colours in 1876 (when registrations of colours commenced).

About 1878 George moved into breeding making important contributions to NZ bloodlines through the importation of sires and broodmares from England & Australia.

Although originally a large punter (he is reputed to have won 9000 pounds when Mata won the 1879 Dunedin Cup) after Lochiel’s NZ Cup win in 1887 he ceased betting with bookmakers & in 1898 he ceased ‘investing’ on the totaliser.

His horses raced all over NZ and he also took horses to Australia at least 27 times, the earliest being 1877. His most successful trip was to the Sydney Spring Carnival of 1905 when he started 4 horses in 9 races for 8 wins including the Derby.

He was the leading owner in NZ for 12 years in the 1890’s & 1900’s.

His horses won 16 Canterbury Champagne Stakes, 13 Canterbury Derby’s, 10 Northern Foal Stakes, 6 Hawkes Bay Stakes, 4 Great Northern Derbys, 4 Auckland Cups, 4 Wellington Cups, 3 NZ Cups, and many other major and minor races. In total he is reputed to have had 181 winners between 1877 & 1908.

George married Lucie Maria Wilkinson on 4 October 1876, they had 4 sons, Wilfred Gatonby, Edgar Fraser, Gerald Lovett & 1 daughter Noel Stuart (later Grace).

George collapsed at the Riccarton races shortly after watching his filly “Golden Slipper” win the Champagne Stakes (his 16th winner in 24 years) and died, 10 days later at his home, Strowan Park, on 29 April 1908.

In recognition of his services to racing he was among the first inductees into the NZ Racing Hall of Fame in 2006. More details of his life can be found in the Dictionary of NZ Biography