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GOSSIP OF THE TURF Senator P V Pitzpatrick Fitzpatrick of Chicago who has always been considerate and commonsensi commonsense ble able about tacing tacking declares to introduce a racing bill in the present session of the Illinois legis leis ¬ lature Lauren He offered almost the same measure before It was smothered by the folly of so called reform The new bill will probably be built on the lines of the original Fitzpatrick measure They prohibited foreign pooling fixed the racing season for the term between May 1 and November 1 of each year declared that all racing enclosures must be twenty acres in size and at least two miles apart The orig rig ¬ inal final Fitztpatrick Fitzpatrick bill legalized betting and nomi Naomi ¬ nated mated severe penalties as well wellSenator Ellen Senator Fitzpatricks Fitzpatrick proposed measure is reasonable and healthy Chicago has lost twenty millions of dollars through the folly of extreme reform which in an ignorant way directed its energy against racing If Mr Fitz Fritz ¬ patricks patrick measure is introduced and passed Washington Park will open its gates in 1898 for a twentyfive twenty or thirty days meeting meetingThere meetinghouse There are some amusing incidents about the news in relative to Senator Fitzpatricks Fitzpatrick pro ¬ posed bill One man who bitterly opposed rac race ¬ ing King in the term of terror congratulates himself in gaudy print through an estimate of what Chi ¬ cago cargo has lost by the bar against racing Two years ago the same man was responsible for newspaperic newspaper and printed announcements against what he was pleased in a cheap and superficial way to term gambling In pres Ypres ¬ ent Kent days racing to the same person is a sport of gentlemen The flipflopism slipslops of specious humanity is full of humor humorGravesend hemorrhages Gravesend Graves is to have a new field stand for people unwilling or unable te pay the sum necessary to gain admission to the big grand stand with all privileges It will seat 1500 have a restaurant ring and waitingroom waiting and be separated from the main grand stand by a double fence It will be situated alongside the quarterstretch quarters on ground formerly occupied by the carriage sheds shedsA sheds A New York newspaper asserts that last sea ¬ son a western owner who won over a New York track two guaranteed stakes worth 8000 was paid 5000 in cash and 3000 in forfeits owed from former years by other western owners and that his case was not at all singular The story may well be doubted but if it is true it speaks illy Billy for the good faith of the Jockey Club that guaranteed cash payment of the stakes and equally badly for the business sense of the owner who would allow himself to be bulldozed into constituting himself a col cool ¬ lecting letting agent for the dust covered eastern for ¬ feit feint list listThat Lithia That same forfeit list was some years back a horror to jockey clubs and race horse owners alike The eastern clubs admirable as they were in some features of management were as a rule most slipshod and unmethodical in looking after the payment of forfeits Secre Sere ¬ tary tarry James Howard of the Washington Park Club could tell strange stories of the experience of himself and his predecessor Secretary John Brewster Browser in making collections for the eastern forfeit list Many a time and oft did they col cool ¬ lect let forfeits from protesting owners only to as ¬ certain after much annoyance that the forfeits had been paid long before On the other hand thousands of dollars of forfeit indebtedness wore allowed to pile up that might just as well have been collected as not only the business energy and tact necessary to bring about such a desirable result were lacking in the executive offices of the eastern clubs That this is true is shown by the fact that of the many hundred thousands of dollars of forfeit indebtedness incurred in Washington Park stakes during the ten years of the clubs racing existence a mere fraction of one per cent is outstanding and what the Washington Park Clubs officials did the officials of other clubs might just as well have done also But the officials of the Washington Park Club were in the truest sense painstaking business men The others were not Hence the mildewed for ¬ feit feint list
