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CHURCHILL DOWNS STAKES RACE DATES. Luke Blackburn and His Remarkable Succession of Triumphs When a Three-Year-Old. Louisville. Ky., August 20. Secretary and treasurer H. C. Applegate of the New Louisville Jockey Club has returned from the east, where he weut to take entries to the stake races to be decided at the coming autumn meeting at Churchill Downs. These events, which closed for entries last Tuesday, the 22nd inst., have filled unusually well and much better all around than the same events for the fall meeting at Churchill Downs last year. Manager M. J. Winn has set the .dates for the running of the stakes. They are as follows: Falls City Handicap, Wednesday, September 1. Golden Itod Stakes, Saturday, September 30. Cherokee Stakes, Monday, October 2. St. Leger Handicap, Thursday, October 5. On all these dates arrangements have been made for special railroad rates on all lines leading into this city from all points in Kentucky. Of all the great horses that figure in the list of winners of the Kentucky St. Leger, when it was a race for three-year-olds, perhaps the champion honors belong to the mighty Luke Blackburn, which won the big race in 1SS0, piloted to victory by the famous rider James McLaughlin. That year as a three-year-old Luke Blackburn made one of the most marvellous campaigns ever scored by a horse of this age. In his first start that year he succumbed in the Phoenix Hotel Stakes at Lexington to Fonso, -which came on here and won the Kentucky Derby that spring. At Sheepshead Bay, while leading in a race on that track he fell, and Duke of Montrose won the race. In over twenty starts, those were his two losing races at that age and, during his memorable campaign that year, he not only defeated all the best three-year-olds but the older horses as -well, running all distances ami carrying the highest of handicap weights. Luke Blackburn possessed every requisite of the greatest, of race horses. He had dazzling speed and apparently could cover any route of ground. When he really came into his own and was at his best he always played hare and . hound with his opponents and in a majority of his races was pulled up almost to a walk as he crossed the -winning line. He -was a handsome blood bay in color, bordering on tifteen three in height, with a wonderful head and neck and a heart of tremendous proportion. He had the easy stride that lias been so marked in many of our best turf performers and which enabled him to run a good race over any sort of a track. He was bought as a yearling for the rather small sum of 10 by Williams and Owings from his breeder, the late Gen. W. H. Jackson of Belle Meade Farm in Tennessee, and, after that firm had raced him as a two-year-old, they sold him privately to Dwyer Bros., in whose colors he ran all of his great races as a three-year-old. When done with racing, General Jackson paid 0,000 to get him back for a sire at the farm where lie was foaled. Of all the later-day horses that have borne -a resemblance when racing to Luke Blackburn, the nearest approach to him is Old Rosebud, which won tin;" record Kentucky Derby in 1914. He possessed the same frictionless stride in running, that is, lie moved to the front with the same ease and then smothered his opponents in the early part of the race by his dazzling exhibition of speed, just like Luke Blackburn did back in 18S0. During his career Luke Blackburn won twenty-five races and 9,400. It may be said that he reproduced himself in the stud when he sent to the races the great Proctor Knott, which won the first Futurity from Salvator. Galen, Senorita and other crack two-year-olds of 1SSS and during iiis turf career earned ,350 in stakes and purses. Iik3 his famous sire. Proctor Knott was not very costly as a yearling, as the late Sam Bryan only paid 00 for him at. that age. With the glamor of such a horse as Luke Blackburn figuring among the winners of the Louisville St. Leger, it. is no wonder that the running of this historic event, always awoke much interest to the race-going public. Even this early things are lively at the Downs track and nearly every day from now on will mark the arrival of horses at this course for the coining local racing season. Even this early,- things are lively at the Downs "course, will arrive here in the next few days and he, manager M. .7. Winn and secretary II. C. Apple-gate have devised attractive races in overnight purses and handicaps, with liberal added money, to feature the afternoons cards on those days that no stake race. is. programmed. All the expensive improvements at this course, which have been under way since the close of the last spring meeting, are now well under way for an early completion and long before the date for the opening, everything will be finished and ready for action. A new fence on the east side of the course now takes in all the ground owned by the New Louisville Jockey Club, and in time all this addition will be greatly improved. The new stables on the clubhouse side of the plant have added no little to the sightliness of this, the most beautiful portion of the ground.
