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ENTAILS AN APPALLING LOSS DEPLORABLE RESULTS OF ANTI-RACING LEGISLATION IN NEW YORK STATE. Algernon Daingcrficld Summarizes the Groat Financial Loss That America Has Already Sustained and Points Out Other Regrettable Effects. The New York World lias Leon publishing a scries of interviews willi prominent eastern racing men on the great loss which America is sustaining because of the enactment of laws in New York state that prevent the racing of thoroughbreds. A day or two ago it published the following: That the lovers of the American thoroughbred horse, gradually being barred by public opinion and adverse legislation from the race tracks of this country through the ban on betting, see a worse fate for the noble creature than the mere discouragement of racing is apparent to anyone who sits down to talk over the situation with any old-time horseman. That America is losing millions of dollars in blue-blooded horses now being exported is not the worst feature in their minds; that the loss is equally great through the abolishing of big breeding stables and the consequent Hood of money they have put in circulation is not the paramount issue, either; that it takes away from our millionaire owners one of their fads that distinguished them as a class does not entirely appeal to them. "Hut that the American horse at large is doomed to become a degenerate, cold-blooded creature of toil and utility without the constant uplift of thoroughbred infusion most concerns them. "Charley Reed, formerly owner of the celebrated Fairview Stud of Tennessee and of many high-class race horses, and who made the first and only bid of 00,000 for the imported stallion St. Blaise when he was put up at auction after the deatli of August Belmont. Sr., and with that one bid obtained the famous English Derby winner and sire for his Iair-view Stud, voiced the general idea of American horse breeders in a talk at Montreal the other day. lint he did not emphasize the particular dread of far-sighted breeders who are looking to the future of the horse in general in this country. " "That something like a death blow has been struck at the high-spirited thoroughbred horse in America cannot be doubted when we look at the facts, said Algernon Daingcrficld, assistant secretary of the Jockey Club and a well-known lover of horses. The great pecuniary loss to America is pot the only one to be considered. Neither is the .sentimental one. lint the danger to the future character of the American horse is a serious menace. The number of thoroughbred horses bred in this country has decreased from an average of 4,700 a few years ago to a bare thousand and less this year. This last figure will be still further decreased in another year, and each and every year fewer and fewer line horses will appear. " The newspapers are constantly receiving letters asking why there cant he racing for the fun of it without bookmaking. There could if the public would patronize the races sulliciently to make it worth while, but it wont. There could if there was some way of fixing the standard of a thoroughbred horse other than the supreme standard of the race track. But there isnt. Wealthy owners are not going to breed line horses with no opportunity of distinguishing between the horse that has speed and the horse that has not. In all the centuries that the thoroughbred has been supreme in the horse world the race track has been the final test of a horses worth, and there is no other test possible. " With possibly one exception there has never been a sire who begot offspring worth 00 that was not himself a racer. Without bookmaking or some equivalent the public will not attend sulliciently to make the receipts great enough to pay good purses. Breeders will not breed horses for 100 pur,ses. Without betting our breed of American horses, opkept by the constant infusion of thoroughbred stock, will degenerate into a race of pigs. " Thoroughbred horses, tracing their ancestry back to the stallions of Arabia, improve all breeds of horses. James B. Ilaggin. for instance, has just imported six Shire stallions from Belgium and other foreign countries. They weigh 1.S00 pounds or more, and be will breed them to thoroughbred mares weighing 1,000 pounds. In this way he expects to gel horses nimble enough to take the. places of the mules of Kentucky, which do wonderful work in the mud and uneven farms of that state. " The Jockey Club started in 1907 a breeding bureau for the good of the country. Wo placed sixty-seven, thoroughbred stallions in New York state with the farmers, the club sending them in charge of competent attendants, paying all the bills and keep, and the farmer getting all stud foes. If this bureau had been established by the state or national government the cost would have been enormous. But the club donated the horses. Experiments in other countries, carried on for years, convinced the club that the Infusion of thoroughbred stock was absolutely necessary for the improvement of all breeds of horses. The bureau has not been discontinued, though much curtailed, and with the entire cessation of racing will cease to be. After the Jockey Club had made all the researches into the scheme, similar organizations were started in twelve other states and in Canada. In all other states except Maryland and Kentucky they were abandoned, due to the cessation of racing, and now the breeding bureau of the Jockey Club of Maryland and the National Breeding Bureau of Canada find it almost impossible to find stallions that they are willing to place in service. " The loss to America from the exporting of horses and the departing to other shores of big stables and wealthy horsemen is another side of the question that is appalling. Just to mention a few is startling. " William Astor Chanler has sent his entire breeding stud from his Virginia racing stables abroad. V. C. and Ogden Bishop, who raced in tills country as the Newcastle Stable, sold their entire stud at auction in France. II. T. Oxnard sells his yearlings and the produce of his Blue Bidge Breeding Farm of Virginia abroad. Paul J. Rainey, the Pittsburg millionaire, entirely forsook the American turf and shipped his horses to France. " James B. Haggin, one of the oldest and largest breeders in the country, is an example of the movement, having exported and disposed of fully 400 broodmares and twenty-five stallions in many "countries, including South American republics. " To tell the truth, the amount of the loss as figured in the papers has been underestimated. I think that the next man to Ilaggin whose establishment has been reduced the most is James It. Keeue. ho having shipped 150 stallions and two-year-olds to the Argentine and his entire crop of two-year-olds and racing stable of 1911 to England. IT. B. Duryea has entirely deserted America as a racing country With a large racing stable and stud. " Harry Payne Whitney, with his entire racing stable, American trainer and all stable help, has gone to England. Mr. Whitney has this year purchased the entire crop of yearlingsfrom the Castle-ton Stud. James B. Keenes great Kentucky breeding place. And all these horsus and all the remainder of his own stable will be shipped to England within the next thirty days. The magnitude of Mr. Whitneys English racing venture may le imagined from his having more than twenty nominations in the English Oaks and Derby. Continued on second page. ENTAILS AN APPALLING LOSS. Continued from first- page. " Clarance H. Mackay has shipped his whole stud, headed by the famous race horse Meddler, and he and Mr. Carroll of Baltimore will race exclusively abroad. " John E. Madden has very much reduced his enormous breeding and racing establishment by sales lo Louis Winans, and has shipped a large consignment of broodmares to Eugene Leigh, another American in France. Frank J. Gould, who said the other day when asked when he Intended returning to France, that he hoped soon, as there was no racing in the United States, Is another example of the loss to this country in patriotic interest. Theodore W. Meyers, former Comptroller of New York; Alex Smith Cochrane, Harry La Montagne, Perry Belmont, Sidney Paget, Do Courcey Forbes and H. M. Zlegler are but n few of the millionaire enthusiasts who have been forced to seek foreign shores for their racing. " From the steeplechase ranks Thomas Hitchcock and Joseph E. Wldeher have both transferred their racing stables to France, and Mr. Widener has but recently engaged the American trainer, Thomas Welsh, and has acquired by purchase forty to fifty English and Frencli bred horses for racing in Europe. " August Belmont, chairman of the Jockey Club, has sent largo consignments from his racing stables abroad and has established a breeding farm in France. " AVhile all this has been a gigantic loss to America, New York State has been the chief sufferer, for in addition to those who have been shipping their racing stables abroad all of the other prominent racing men in America, both those who race for amusement and those who are professionals, have been obliged to transfer all their racing operations to the west and to Canada. Such men as S. C Hil-dreth, who owns the most formidable racing stable in America today; R. F. Carman, wiUi a stable of thirty-eight horses; August Belmont, with what he has left of his stable In America, and R. T. Wilson, have all been forced to absolutely abandon the beautiful race fourses of New York State and move bag and baggage to Canada and the west. " The expenses of almost every racing stable mentioned atvovo would be over 00,000 a year, and in many instances much more. No money Is more absolutely put in circulation than that paid for the maintenance of a racing and breeding stable. " The Jockey Club derives no good from betting, hut the public seems to lose its interest when bet--vling ceases. The men who have been breeding horses in America for racing do not care for the purses as much as they do the satisfaction of breeding line, fast horses. "
