Colins Ghost

In 1919, Saratoga Race Course hosted the 50th running of the Travers Stakes. Hannibal, the son of Olambala, easily beat his five opponents – stopping the clock at 2:02 4/5 just a few ticks off the track record set by Sun Briar in 1918. (It is safe to say that the track played fast in 1919 — records were broken or challenged throughout the meet).

What was most notable about the 50th Travers was who do note compete. Sir Barton – the first colt to sweep the three races that would come to be known as the Triple Crown – did not run in the 1919 Travers. The other top three-year-olds – Purchase, Billy Kelly, and Mad Hatter – also skipped the Travers. In Joe Palmer’s recap of 1919 – written in 1941 – Hannibal merits nothing more than a brief mention in his review of the three-year-old class.

While the race itself proved forgettable, Travers day in 1919 must have been memorable for those in attendance.

Here is how the New York Times described it on August 17, 1919:

“It was estimated that 30,000 persons were present at the course today. Not only were the stands packed until it was almost impossible to move through the aisles but the crowd was so dense on the lawns that it was difficult to find an open space in the great enclosure. Many visitors from nearby towns and from New York had come up for the weekend, and so many automobiles arrived at the grounds that it was necessary to throw the paddock open for parking space. The crowds poured into the stands for two hours before the racing began, and in order to give all a chance to see the sport from the very beginning, the first race was not run until 3 o’clock”

A few days later the Daily Racing Form had this:

“In the great throng of Saturday, which overcrowded the grandstand and clubhouse and fringed the homestretch and the turns for a half mile, were several old time turfmen who had seen most of the fifty races for the Travers Stakes. W. S. Vosburgh, for thirty years official handicapper of the Jockey Club, was one of them, his first visit to the Saratoga races having been in 1869.

“John A. Morris, of Kentucky, came in the early 70s and recalled the annual race in which the negro trainer Ansel, a famous turf character of old slavery days, led the ‘man eater’ Tom Bowling to the post for the Travers with a long rope which he deftly cut to free the horse as the flag dropped, and the son of Lexington ran the race with a piece of it dangling about his heels.

“But the oldest old-timer of them all was Leon N. Salmon, a veteran of the Civil War, who was scales and acting secretary of the races in John Morrissey’s day and is now an officer of the Supreme Court in Brooklyn. Looking scarcely old enough to antedate the first Travers race, Mr Salmon said he had seen them all, his summers having been spent in Saratoga since boyhood, and he is now in his seventy fifth year.”

It is amazing to think that the Travers already had a rich history way back in 1919. And here we are 90 years later, getting ready to run it again.

I have spent some time over the last few weeks reading the Racing Form’s coverage of the 1919 Saratoga meet. Even though the current online edition only includes issues up to August 20th (I assume the remainder will be digitized at some point), it is still full of interesting stories and quotes from the Saratoga scene 90 years ago.

Here are a few of my favorites –

As I mentioned in a post a few weeks ago, 1919 was an important year for Saratoga and racing. It was a record breaking year in terms of attendance according to this from Aug 11, 1919:

“Saturdays attendance was the largest in the history of Saratoga. ‘The nearest approach in numbers was in 1904,” said [Racing secretary] Mr. Earlocker, who has charge of the statistical end of the association . ‘We sold out of everything on Saturday last, but we expect to eclipse all past records next Saturday, which our books show is the prospective big day of the season, being the third Saturday of the meeting. We shall order at least 2000 more programs for that occasion.’”

Saratoga is famously known as the Graveyard of Favorites — 1919 was no exception:

“Backers of favorites are squirming under punishment since the meeting started here. Few of the first choices have connected. The rank and file are beginning to look at all favorites with suspicion. The wise handicappers are profiting by the downfall of choices for no other reason than many of the favorites have been quoted at exceedingly short figures and some of them come under the head of false favorites…Favorite backers are not usually good handicappers but rely on the market for their tips. This is where the experts and cold form backers reap the harvest of their intelligence”

The opening race on Aug 5, 1919 was run under unusual conditions as described in the DRF:

“The record number of thirty were carded in the initial dash. Its conditions were such as to secure the attention of every owner with an ordinary racer. It had French claiming attachments that is a carded starter could be claimed before the race but his transfer then to another establishment automatically barred him from starting in the race. The rule also provides the claiming of a horse after the race.”

Two were claimed before the race — here is the chart:

On Aug 8, 1919, the Form quoted trainer Tom Welch explaining his reasoning for pulling one of Joseph Widener’s runner’s from the previous day’s feature:

“Tom Welch withdrew Naturalist from the Delaware Handicap for the reason that he did not want to spoil the present disposition of the horse, which has been far better the past two months than it has been in his career. ‘I have just educated him into running kindly over any kind of track,’ Mr Welch said, ‘and I don’t want to destroy his disposition. Last year he acted badly in two races over here and I am a bit fearful he may return to the habit if his temper is ruffled…’

Naturalist would run later in the meet in two races that had the Racing Form calling the gelding the “greatest sprinters that the American turf has ever known.” Seems like he never got over his disposition problem. A note on his pedigree query page has this alongside his race record: “extremely bad-tempered.”

Also on August 8, 1919, E.R. Bradley — who turned a bookmaking business into one of the most successful breeding and racing operations during the era — had this rambling reaction to winning the first race on that day’s card:

“‘Perseverance is a virtue,’ said E.R. Bradley while being showered with congratulations after Binding Tie’s victory in the first race. ‘It is the first race that I have won in Saratoga in four years. I have always brought what I considered a good band of horses here but always something happened to them on arrival or after that caused their failure to race to their best. There is a maxim that happenings always come in cycles of three and as I have experienced three years of lean in the past I am now ready for the fat. I have a right to believe in the cycle of three for I have had three of my managers die in a short period, have had three colts go wrong on the eve of their important stake engagements, and the investments in oil that I made were bad. The fourth however was successful.’”

Makes perfect sense, right?

And finally, from the turf gossip section on August 10th 1919, some words of wisdom from an unknown (and long dead) Saratoga patron:

“My bank roll is just dying a peaceful and happy death,” said one of the prominent clubhouse members after he had made six wagers and lost all of them. “But I am coming back smiling and full of hope. Its no use getting grouchy. Nobody can win with a grouch on.”

As true today, as it was then. Enjoy!

SOURCES, NOTES, AND OBSERVATIONS

All the above quoted from – my new addiction – the Historic DRF Online. They recently updated their homepage — check it out!

Thanks for all who commented on last week’s post about Upset. I am especially pleased that a few of you commented on the past performances from the Sanford. The evolution of PPs is a fascinating topic — more on that in a future post

I will be arriving at the SPA for Travers weekend on Thursday morning. Mrs. Colin’s Ghost will be staying home for this trip so i’ll be flying solo. Shoot me an email or a tweet if you would like to meet up and compare notes.

THANKS FOR READING AND GOOD LUCK!

If you had opened your Daily Racing Form on August 13, 1919, you would have seen these past performances for race four at Saratoga:

OK, who do you like?

Of course, we all know what happened, Man O’ War, the great two-year-old colt owned by Sam Riddle, was beaten by H.P. Whitney’s Upset. This unlikely result is one of the most legendary “upsets” in American sports history and has inspired an often repeated tale about the origins of that very word.

Most of us have heard the story that Man O’ War’s loss in the Stanford was the reason the term “upset” became part of American sports vernacular. A good story – no doubt – but easily proven false with a little digging in primary sources.

In 2006, when Dorothy Ours published her superb book about Man O’ War she buried this little nugget in the end notes:

“Sports headlines predating the 1919 Sanford Memorial prove the term upset for an unexpected result did not originate with Upset beating Man o’ War. For example, ‘Days of Upsets at Belmont Park….’ New York Herald, Sept 7, 1918 and ‘Upsets at Jefferson Park,’ Daily Racing Form, March 16, 1919.”

Image: Upset beating Man O’ War (Associated Press)

Laura Hillenbrand in her wildly popular Seabiscuit also acknowledged the myth. While she didn’t offer any examples, she did write “…reporters covering the [1919 Sanford] noted how coincidental it was that Man o’ War should lose to a horse with such a name.”

According to the book Word Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends, a researcher found a “sporting use” of the term as early as 1865 and found this in the New York Times from July 17, 1877:

“The program for today at Monmouth Park indicates a victory for the favorite in each of the four events, but racing is so uncertain that there may be a startling upset.”

With the availability of full-text searching for the New York Times and the Daily Racing Form, it is possible to do a little debunking from the comfort of your own home.

A quick search of historic DRF online at Kentuckiana Digital Library finds these:

April 4, 1908:
“The biggest upset of the afternoon came with the running of the last race in which Poquessing was a pronounced favorite. Park Row raced the favorite into defeat in the first half but was forced to do his best at the end to withstand the game challenge of Killiecrankie”

June 25, 1908:
“No three-year-old has carried off the Royal Hunt Cup at Ascot England since Refractor upset the heavily weighted Eager in 1899.”

June 11, 1913:
“The $1,000 handicap at one mile and a eighth that served as a feature in today’s racing at Latonia furnished a big upset…”

August 13, 1918:
“The Seneca Stakes…resulted in a big upset in the victory of Sweep Up II…”

These are just a few of the many examples that predate the 1919 Stanford.

Image: The Magnificent Man O’ War (Keeneland Library)

Upset – the horse – will forever live in the lore of racing for being the only blemish on the record of one of racing’s all-time greats. But claiming he made a contribution to the language of American sports, while it makes for a good story, is absolutely false.

SOURCES, NOTES, AND OBSERVATIONS

Dorothy Ours book about Man O’ War is a must read for any fan of racing history. Her meticulous research and ability to tell a good story, makes the book a real joy.

David Wilton wrote Word Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends published by the Oxford University Press in 2002

Quotes from the Daily Racing Form and the past performances from the 1919 Sanford are from the highly touted online version of DRF

THANKS FOR READING AND GOOD LUCK!