Horse Players Riot at Suffolk Downs, 1945
Kevin on Dec 22nd 2009 06:19 pm |
Tags: horse race track riots, Suffolk Downs
One of the real joys in writing for this site is doing the research. It is amazing the historical trails that can be followed via the internet. As someone who remembers doing research before the web, it is astounding what can be discovered while sitting on your couch. If you have ever had microfilm-motion-sickness, you understand the luxury of researching on the internet
A few days back, I was poking around in my usual way and landed on the search terms “racetrack riots.” I had been searching for a particular incident when runners for local pool rooms and race track security clashed in Chicago. That is an incident I’m sure to revisit in a future post but I began uncovering accounts of horseplayer riots that were equally fascinating and bizarre.
A found a handful of horseplayer insurrections at tracks in Europe and North America. The most recent one of significance in the United States (that I could find) was at Roosevelt Raceway in 1963, when players demanded and then rioted in efforts to get refunds on their daily double tickets after a mass pileup eliminated six of the eight betting interests. Fifteen people were arrested and the head of track security died of a heart attack during the altercation. Reports called the riot the “worst in harness history.”
In 1975, horseplayers rioted at a harness track in Canada called Richelieu. Like the riot at Roosevelt, it also came as the result of confusion over an exotic bet (referred to as a “gimmick” in the article). When a statistical coincidence resulted in a $58.50 mutuel on a straight win bet and and the exact same $58.50 on a quinella payout in the eighth race, horse players smelled a fix and showed their displeasure by causing $50,000 in damages.
A riot in Europe took place at a track in Vincennes, France in 1930 when five trotters were left at the gate at the start of the first race. Punters “wrecked the grandstands, raided the bars, and continued rioting until assured that entrance money and all bets would be refunded.” When it was decided that bettors would be refunded, “the mob quieted and began lining up at the various gates to get their money back.” Nothing like the promise of a few bucks to transition a riot to an orderly queue.
Interestingly, most of the horsplayer riots I came across occurred at harness tracks (i’d love to hear some theories on this?).
With the exception of clashes between bookmakers and police found in the early part of the century, the most significant incidents I found at a thoroughbred track occurred at Suffolk Downs. The first was in 1944, and the second, in 1945, described this way by the the Associated Press:
“Police reserves were rushed to the Suffolk Downs horse track late Saturday as an angry crowd of spetators rushed the stewards stand and smashed the equipment in protest against a disqualification.
“The disturbance began as the number of the favorite, Johnny jr., was hauled down a winner of the co-featured $5,000 Commonwealth. Windmill, owned by Mrs. T. Haskos and A. Spilos was declared winner after Johnny jr., was disqualified for fouling.
“One spectator climbed into the stewards pagoda, when two policmen grabbed him, about 100 booing spectators swarmed on the track, one of them hurling a bottle through the door of the official stand. A shower of bottles followed and the stewards huddled on the floor, holding chairs up for protection. Police prevented a group from overturning a tractor used to harrow the track. After 45 minutes, track police called out the reserves with tear gas and riot guns and the crowd was dispersed.
“The jockeys’ scale was smashed in the riot, a policeman’s motorcycle sidecar was set afire and an attempt to burn an awning opposite the finish stand was frustrated.
“The eighth race, final event of the Suffolk season, was called off because Massachusetts law does now allow horseracing after 7 p.m. It had been delayed as the crowd roamed the track.”
I love the last line here: Are we to assume that if the riot ended before the 7 o’clock curfew the 8th would have gone off as planned? Times sure have changed – I have to think that an incident like this today would bring about a Congressional hearing and calls for the banishment of the sport.
SOURCES, NOTES, AND OBSERVATIONS
Thanks to the Horseplayers Association blog for mentioning and linking to my site last week in their piece about takeout. Also, a thanks to John Pricci who was inspired by the HANA post to write an article at Horserace Insider about Colin and the “good old days” when tracks had dress codes. I wonder what the rioters were wearing when they tried to burn down the steward stand at Suffolk back in the “good old days”?
A new set of letters to a new horseplayer are up at the Hello Race Fans site including one that I wrote. Check it out!
Happy Holidays everyone! Thanks for reading!
Filed in thoroughbred racing history
The site looks terrific, and the only downside to the ease of research is finding enough time to write about it all. Thanks for sharing the fruits of your labor, and Merry Christmas–
That’s Why my home track had the nickname “Sufferin’Downs”!!
Nice story.
I think its high time horseplayers start riots at tracks across the country to protest takeout rates and the numerous other issues killing this great sport…
Kevin,
Great piece. Re the link “clashes between bookmakers and police”…still laughing at the image of the bookmaker as he “bit, clawed and kicked with desperation”
Awesome stuff, as always, Kevin, and so true about the ease of stumbling across great material these days. And to think, when I was in undergrad, all our library had was an old-fashioned card catalog! God bless the Internet
Happy holidays!
My guess as to why most of the riots have occurred at Harness tracks is that there is a much wider perception of chicanery at Harness tracks. So when the unwashed see “proof” right in front of their eyes it doesn’t take much to get many of them to return to a state of nature.
I was at the Weymouth (ma.) Fair in the early 70′s when people stormed the judges stand.
Sports Illustrated did a small story on it. A horse went the wrong way after a spill, the track announncer told the jockeys to pull up their mounts,some did, some didn’t, then they declared a winner and paid off. The crowd went crazy & stormed the judges stand.Police we’re called to quell the crowd.
God, do I miss the Fairs.
If anybody has any good Mass fair circuit stories I would love to hear them
I share a great love for the Massachusetts Fair circuit, cheating and all. It was the first horse racing experience for many of my friends and I.
Bring back Northhapton!
Who wouldn’t love being a 13-year-old kid betting on 13- year-old horses running three times a week around turns tighter than Paris Hilton’s blue jeans?
Albert Florio winning aboard Grey Lawn in the Au Revoir (I think they went around six times). Popover. Cee the Fox.
Forty six year ago I was 11 years old and selling cokes for the Duke in the stands at Weymouth Fair when my older brother (Ed who posted above) informed me I was going to be a one-quarter investor in a horse named Man O’ Kent. I forked over 50 cents and Man O’ Kent won and paid $12. I got $3 and was hooked too.
“Hey Mister, can you make a bet for us?” Fair week came and we would actually go around and collect early on our paper routes so we’d have a stake.
It never got better than that.
Now this is insurrection –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5DKoIAn45g
This reminds me of when two people at Emerald Downs interrupted an otherwise calm day of handicapping to have an argument about abortion.
Neither of these two men had a right to even possess a thought about abortion yet the argument ensued.
One person kept giving the religious stance on the subject, with spoken paragraph after paragraph, while the other simply responded “It’s LEGAL!”, time and again without adding more.
Eventually, the religious zealot ended up stabbing his own “Oriental Chicken Salad” with his own fork with such ferocity that most of the salad left the bowl and landed all over the clothing of an innocent 3rd-party bystander!
I realize I’m a little late to the conversation about the Mass. fairs but I wanted to mention my introduction to the fair circuit. It was the late ’50s at Great Barrington. I was about 12 or 13. Tommy Maeda won something like three of the first four races. It must have been his day. Anyway, I concluded that this was an easy game. All I had to do was bet Tommy Maeda’s horse and I could collect. I couldn’t understand why people hadn’t figured this out. I soon discovered there were some holes in my theory, but I always had a soft spot for Tommy Maeda.
Things certainly have changed.
My Communist racing-provider, New Jersey Account Wagering (wagering competition is ILLEGAL in N.J.) and Magna (a bankrupt racing organization) are at war over money, as we speak.
Which means that my at-home betting system yesterday offered Aqueduct, Meadowlands harness, and a slew of dinky tracks, some I haven’t even heard of ($1,900 purses, etc.). All the Magna track feeds are GONE.
I know racing history, and how the fans in the past vented their frustrations at the track when ill-, mal-, and other sorts of treacherous-feasances occurred.
So WHAT if we never actually GO to a racetrack, anymore? SMASH!
Now, I have to figure out how I can explain to the missus why we need a new front picture window in our living room.
This is why racing really is a pain in the glass.
Early 1980s, a weeknight at Meadowlands Racetrack in New Jersey . . .
A Jack Van Berg entry (maidens, I think) goes to the post as the heavy favorites; one half of the entry is ridden by a 10-pound bug; the other half is ridden by Angel Cordero, Jr.
Cordero’s mount (the well meant half of the entry) scratches at the gate, leaving the bugboy with the balance of the public’s money riding on his shoulders.
Of course, bugboy’s mount is nowhere near the front as the horses pass under the wire. With Cordero’s reputation for alleged chicanery, the cynics in the crowd became vociferous about the turn of events that cost them a lot of money.
That’s when the stewards made a big mistake in response to the increasingly restive nature of the attendees.
After the race had been made official and many tickets discarded, the stewards declared the entire Van Berg entry a non-starter for wagering purposes, with refunds available for anyone who could produce a losing ticket on that entry.
Naturally, most such tickets had been discarded and were now resting in garbage receptacles. And several such garbage bins had been set on fire before the stewards’ reversal was announced.
So, you had the spectacle of spectators laying claim to garbage bags (which might contain lost tickets) at the same time as maintenance personnel were hustling to remove such bags from sight so as to prevent more fires. I actually witnessed a “fan” and a maintenance person having a tug of war over a Hefty® bag; one of the most enduring memories of my three decades whiled away at racetracks.
This event was solely responsible for the rule now in effect at many tracks whereby an entry runs for purse money only if one-half of the entry scratches after wagering has begun.
Like you, I always have to research things.
The horse in question in the 1945 incident was Johnny Jr:
152 – 22 – 33 – 26 $ 57,525
They don’t make many like that anymore.
Hi Don,
Every once in awhile I google my Dad and I was happy to see your memories.
Just a lil’ tidbit about my dad and Great Barrington – My dad met mom there and they eloped to Ohio, on the way to another horse meet. My grandmothers house was on top of the hill and we could watch the races from backyard, after parking cars out front. One of my sisters was born in Great Barrington and we spent our summers there as kids, but our home base was Rhode Island. Dad rode primarily @ Lincoln Downs (before it became a greyhound track), Naragansett Downs and Suffolk Downs.
Dad rode into his late 50′s, ending his career in Charlestown, WV. Due to a hip replacement, he fell, hit his head and passed 6/14/99.
I miss my father terribly, but I can tell you, I had the best childhood around the fairs and I wouldn’t have changed a thing.
Oh, my younger sister, Christine, married an assistant trainer and she herself works with the horses in Hershey, PA. She is right now, down @ Santa Anita with my mother, getting ready to watch Zenyatta run. Horseracing is just in the blood and no one can really understand it, unless they’ve lived it.
Thanks again for your kind memories… Kate
I remember that day like it was yesterday. I was a young Kid(14) that Saturday afternoon and went to the track with my Mother and Father and as you described the riot it was just exactly what I saw from begining until we left. Once the burning started and I thought soldiers from fort Banks came to the track my folks decided it was time to leave and that was about 6:15. I remember Babe Rubinstien(?) yelling over the PA system there would be no last race if the rioters kept throwing glass on the track. It was really scary.
Thanks for the change to go back in time…
I remember that day like it was yesterday. I was a young Kid(14) that Saturday afternoon and went to the track with my Mother and Father and as you described the riot it was just exactly what I saw from begining until we left. Once the burning started and I thought soldiers from fort Banks came to the track my folks decided it was time to leave and that was about 6:15. I remember Babe Rubinstien(?) yelling over the PA system there would be no last race if the rioters kept throwing glass on the track. It was really scary. but what a day.
I am so happy to see a posting from Tommy Meada’s daughter. I grew up in Weymouth,got hooked on the fair circuit @ 12 years old and miss it so much.
My first bet was on a 2/5 fave that ran out,(not T Maeda but Jose Pelez in the Irons) In today’s politically correct world it would be hard to believe but the police chief’s wife (mrs O) was our main source of placing wagers because she thought we always had good tips. My friend Danny’s family was well off & well connected in town. We sold cokes,used paper route money,ran scams whatever we could to get bets in.On the final day you would never return the coke trays or any of the money to “The Duke”.
Tommy Meada was absolutely my favorite jock. There was nobody better at breaking on top than T Maeda. There were times when you’d be reading the Telegraph and see where he was brought in to ride a “hot horse” @ Liberty Bell or Suffolk or Rockingham that had to break on top to win. We cashed bets on Ray Pasquerelli, Eddie Marabona, Amos Martinez etc. but there was nothing better than T maeda whipping and banging coming out of the gate with the red #1 silk on some bet down chalk at “aout 5 furlongs”.