Open Polo

The Greentree polo team is named for the Long Island estate of John Hay ("Jock") Whitney, who has been trying for five years to win the National Open Championship. To help him at Meadow Brook last week, he had Cecil Calvert Smith, the hard-riding Texas cowboy who was called the greatest player of the year after the West beat the East at Chicago last August (TIME, Aug. 21, 28); and two of the Balding brothers, Gerald and Ivor, who come from England to the U. S. for every polo season.

The Auroras are led by wiry little Banker Seymour Horace ("Shorty'') Knox, of Buffalo's East Aurora Polo Club. There were no other Buffalonians on his team last week. His back was large, smiling Elmer J. Boeseke Jr. of California. Between Knox at No. 1 and Boeseke were two Long Islanders, Jimmy Mills and Elbridge ("Ebby") Gerry II.

They were the finalists in last week's National Open Polo Championship. In polo, "Open" has a special meaning. There are no professionals in the game. Teams for the Open are organized by leaders whose position is a little bit like that of a small boy who has been given a new football. Equipped with money and mounts to outfit their teams, they select crack players for their sides. Thus last week, Greentree had reached the final by beating C. V. ("Sonny") Whitney's Westburys and Winston Guest's Templetons, who won the title last year. The Auroras, with a bye in the draw, had ridden over Stephen ("Laddie") Sanford's Hurricanes.

Evenly handicapped--25 goals for Greentree and 26 for Aurora--the finalists were almost even on the Scoreboard after the first four chukkers--6 goals for the Auroras to 5 for Whitney's team. But the crowd in the blue Meadow Brook stands had noticed two surprising differences between the teams. Seymour Knox's ponies were stretching their necks ahead of Greentree's in races for the ball and "Big Bo'' Boeseke, mounted splendidly on Red Ace, Dos de Oro and Cacique, was clearly outplaying Smith. In the seventh chukker, Boeseke barely saved himself from a bad fall when his pony wheeled too sharply; a few moments later he had his hand bruised by a mallet. By this time Aurora, having gained four goals in the fifth chukker, two each in the sixth and seventh, had built up a six-goal lead. Smith, consistently ridden off by Knox, the smallest man on the field, broke loose finally in the last chukker but Greentree's rally came too late. When the game was over, 14 to 11, Mrs. Seymour Knox presented the championship trophies to her husband and his teammates; to Strumma, the chestnut pony that had carried Knox through three chukkers went the Prince Friarstown Cup, annually awarded to the best breeding mare used in the tournament.

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