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INCREASE VALUE OF STAKES Kings Plate and Toronto Cup Are Increased to 5,000 Added — Result of Tax Reduction. TORONTO, Ont., March 31.— The Ontario Jockey Club announced this afternoon that following the reduction made by the provincial legislature in the daily tax on race tracks, it has been decided to increase the value of the Kings Plate by ,000 and the Toronto Cup by a similar amount, the added value of each race being now 5,000. Thus Canadas leading jockey club is sharing with the horsemen the benefits that will be derived as a result of the governments decision to ease the burden on Ontario tracks. While the increase in the added value of the Kings Plate was not altogether unexpected, rumors of the impending increase having been aired the past week or so. the addition to the value of the Toronto Cup came as a surprise. In announcing the substantial increase to the Ontario Jockey Clubs two most important stakes, secretary S. W. P. Fraser tells of the remarkable progress, from a racing, breeding and financial aspect, of the historic Kings Plate. This year will be the sixty-eighth running of the Plate, the initial value of which, in 1860, was fifty pounds 50, the gift of Queen Victoria, until in 1927 the race has a value of fifty guineas, given by His Majesty, to which is added the sum of 5,000 and a silver cup to the owner of the winner. The thirty-fifth running of the Toronto Cup this year will have the very substantial sum of 5,000 added to a sweepstakes of 0 each and 0 additional from starters. The Toronto Cup has always encouraged the best class of handicap horses to come to Toronto and, in popularity, at the spring meeting of the Ontario Jockey Club at Woodbine, it ranks second only to the Kings Plate. The latter stake will be run on the first day of the spring meeting and the Toronto Cup on the closing day. "The object of racing is the improvement of the breed of horses," Mr. Fraser points out. "which is the reason why we have every year in Ontario the race for the Kings Plate, for the encouragement of horse breeding. The breed of horses cannot be improved without racing. There is absolutely no other way of ascertaining the horse that will be useful in perpetuating his kind."
