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Here and There on the Turf August Belmont, Sportsman. End of Brilliant Career. What the Turf Owes. Influence in Breeding. All the turf of every country mourns the death of August Belmont, chairman of the Jockey Club and the foremost figure in both thoroughbred racing and breeding. Racing and breeding has never suffered a more crushing loss than the calamitous taking off of this sterling sportsman. No man gave as generously of his many talents and his wealth to the building up of the turf and no man in history did more for the upbuilding of the American thoroughbred breeding interests. It was the wisdom and courage of August B Imont that carried the racing through many vicious attacks that from time to time threatened the life of the sport in this country. He made racing a life work, though one of the biggest figures in the financial, social and political world, and it was the turf that ever commanded his best efforts. In his long and brilliant career as a sportsman there are many everlasting monuments to his genius, his courage and his untiring energy in furthering the greatest of all sports. The importations of the best of foreign blood obtainable, regardless of cost, is one of these memorials to August Belmont that will live long aftsr the present generation is gone and forgotten. This we?l-nigh priceless thoroughbred blood has enriched the American strain until our horse is the peer of any and the strains resultant from Mr. Belmonts careful mating of the best will go on to a greatness that even now may be its infancy, though it was at his Nursery Stud that he produced the nmhty Man o War, the greatest American thoroughbred and possibly the greatest thoroughbred of any country. And both England and France has a like profound appreciation of the breeding triumphs of the dead sportsman. It was August Belmont who brought the great stallion, Rock Sand, to this county, and that same Rock Sand gave to breeding the marc Mahubah, dam of Man o "War. It was August Belmonts Tracery, a son of Rock Sand, that was the best cup horse in England and a horse that was only robbed of victory in the Ascot Gold Cup becauss of having been thrown down by a fanatic, leaving Prince Palatine to achieve the victory. These are only some of the high lights of the breeding and racing glories of August Belmont. He had inherited his love of the thoroughbred horse and of the turf from his illustrious father, and he carried the fame of he Belmont silks and the Belmont breeding to far greater heights. Next year August Belmont would have celebrated his thirtieth year as chairman of the Jockey Club. He was chairman in fact and his strength of character on frequent occasions was all that carried him through for his long term cf office. Never was his dictatorship seriously threatened for at all times he gave and gave bountifully of his time and talents lo his high office. It was August Belmont who held the Jockey Club together through the many vicissitudes of the sport. His was the guiding hand arid his the controlling intellect when only a man of his talents and courage could save the day for the sport. From early boyhood August Belmont was peculiarly fitted for the high office he held go brilliantly at the time of .his death. . With his 2 3 4 5 1 : inherited love for the horse he was a courageous polo player and a familiar figure in the hunting field. He was one of the founders of the Meadow Brook Hunt and did much to further the amateur sport while he w?as still little more than a youth. A member of the first New York State Commission, he served with E. D. Morgan and John Sanford on that body with the same force that characterized his chairmanship of the Jockey Club. It was he who. conceived the breeding bureau that afforded farmers opportunity to breed to thoroughbred sires. He made liberal donations of richly bred stallions both to this cause and to the various army breeding posts that were afterwards established. And with his multitudinous duties in the government of racing August Belmont devoted a like energy to the government of the destinies of the Westchester Racing Association of which he was the president. In 1905 the racing ground of this old association was moved to the beautiful Nassau County course, at Queens, Long Island, from Morris Park, and this greatest of all American courses bears his name Belmont Park. While the lamented head of racing in this country always grave credit to Robert L. Gerry for conceiving the idea of the international races, it was he who did more than any other man to make possible the invasion of Ben Irishs Papyrus and Pierre Werth-eimers Epinard to this country. There was a crowning . joy for Mr. Belmont when his Ladkin, a product of his Nursery Stud "in Kentucky, was winner of the mile International race at Aqueduct over, the mighty Epinard, and in that victory Jtc was fittingly repaid for the efforts that made the coming of Epinard possible. This fall it was also his proud boast that he had bred both the sire of Papyrus, Tracery, and the dam of Epinard, Epine Blanche. For a time the Belmont silks were absent from the turf, but this year thdrc had been an adequate return. of the glories of the scarlet with maroon sleeves and black cap. Ladkin and Ordinance were two colts that gave the silks a befitting importance, and there was general rejoicing that the famous old colors were coming into then own. At the time of his taking off Mr. Belmont was considering plans for other international races for 1925. To that end Colonel Matt Winn, general manager of the Kentucky Jockey Club, was in New .York, and he was to have met Mr. Belmont and discuss the plans. Of the three sportsmen who arranged the three races of Epinard in this country Colonel Winn is the only one remaining, James Shev-lin, president of the Queens County Jockey Club, which staged the Aqueduct race, having died this fall. With the passing of August Belmont there comes the problem of his successor as chairman of the Jockey Club.- - At this time his associates are so stunned by his death that naturally this discussion is out of the question, but it is. a question that will have to be answered before long. The natural choice for the high office appears to be Jossph E. Widener, a man peculiarly fitted to govern the sport. Mr. "Widener has every attribute that would make him a. fit ting suqcessor. On, and apparently the only objection that might be. raised to the election of Mr. Widener to the chairmanship, is the fact that he is .a resident of Philadelphia and not New York. August Belmont, by his long and brilliant control of the turf as chairman of the New York governing body, will make many hesitate to assume the duties from which he was taken by death. But August Belmont built well and the racing, now on its crest wave, owes him much and the plane to which it has come will tend to smooth the way for his successors.
