Fading Hoofbeats

U.S. horse racing has become so organized that there has usually been racing every weekday every week of the year. Last Monday, for the first time in 13 years,* horse players were unable to place a bet anywhere in the U.S. Of some 15,000 thoroughbreds of racing age, not one was running. The 600 at Miami's Tropical Park were stalled when the track closed as a result of the Government's ban on pleasure driving. Those at New Orleans' Fair Grounds, the only race track open, were taking their customary Monday off --a practice instituted to stretch the track's allotted racing days into a longer season.

Of the horses stranded in Miami, only a few--like Warren Wright's glamorous Whirlaway and other popular headliners --could secure stall space at New Orleans' already jampacked Fair Grounds. Others may be shipped to Mexico City for the opening of the HipOdromo do las Americas, a brand-new race track whose directors include Manhattan Financier Bernard E. Smith, Detroit Automan E. L. Cord, Manhattan Architect John Sloan, and other U.S. bigwigs. But to the average horse owner the horse is beginning to look like a white elephant.

In the past year, while feed bills have gone up 50%, purses have gone down--and ever threatening is the possibility of total wipeout. California's munificent Santa Anita race track, whose purses approximated $1,000,000 a season, has been taken over by the Army for an Ordnance training center. Blacked out along with Tropical last week was Hialeah Park's 46-day meeting--with $500,000 in scheduled purses. By spring more tracks may be forced to close. The Government may even ban shipment of horses from track to track.

With characteristic optimism, horsemen are willing to bet their ration cards that U.S. hoofbeats will not fade out completely. Basis for their optimism is the probable centralization of race meets. First move in that direction was taken last week by Chicago's five racing associations. Under a lend-lease arrangement, Arlington Park, Washington Park and Lincoln Fields --all on the city's outskirts--made plans to hold their spring and summer meetings, if necessary, at Hawthorne or Sportsman's Park, both accessible by elevated and streetcar lines.

Come what may, the Kentucky Derby will be the last to disappear from the U.S. racing scene. "Unless the Government bans horse racing," declared the Derby's venerable impresario Matt Winn last week, "the Derby will be run on the scheduled date [May 1], even if only two horses go to the post and even if the crowd does not exceed a half-dozen persons." With a stake of $75,000 to shoot at, many a horseman may do well to get on his horse's back, start cantering to Louisville.

*On March 31, 1930, before racing dates dovetailed so smoothly, there was a one-day gap between the closing of New Orleans' Fair Grounds and the opening of Miami's Tropical Park.

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