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DELAYED AT ASHLAND Rail Strikes Retard Plans to Conu plete Course in Time for Racing This Year. LEXINGTON, Ky., October 3. Ben "Williamson of Ashland, one of the leading busl ness men of the Big Sandy Valley, has been elected to the board of directors of the Trl-State Fair and Racing Association, which is building a magnificent racing plant In Greenup County, near Russell, within six miles of Ashland and immediately across tho river from Ironton, Ohio. The other five directors of the association are Messrs. Charles H. Berryman, Lexington, president; Dr. Andrew Clark Lowry, Ironton, vice-president; J. O. Keene, Lexington, general manager; Thomas B. Cromwell, Lexington, secretary, and John S. Barbee, Lexington, treasurer. President Berryman, who just returned from visiting the new racing ground, said: " was most agreeably surprised at the progress that has been made toward completion of our plant, and I am gratified to see that general manager Keene has brought along? the work with characteristic thoroughness. We had planned at the beginning of our movement for the establishment of the enter prise to have it ready for racing this autumn. FIRST MEETING IN 1923. "But the rail strike knocked those plans into a cocked hat, and we now are steadily and thoroughly completing the work that we may have everything in apple-pie order for a meeting to follow the close at Latonia next summer, if it is the judgment of tho State Racing Commission that we should have dates at that time of the year. "We are building something more than a mere race track. We have 260 acres of beautifully lying land upon which there are springs and a stream of good water, several groves and a large woodland. We are putting down wells for better and purer water than we could get from the Ohio River, which is near by, and we will have a beautiful lake in the center of the field. We will make our park a community center for recreation. Everything in the way of equipment for that purpose will be of the best and thoroughly up to date. "Our plant will carry an appeal to horsemen who are seeking ideal winter quarters. No track in Kentucky will dry out more quickly. In this respect it will be even better than was the Memphis track, which was for many years the favorite retreat of those who desired to have their horses ready for spring racing. "I found the people of that section very enthusiastic about the new enterprise and eager for its complete establishment, and we are very pleased with the co-operation we are getting from those who reside in that section."
