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J « J , t s * j j i -1 J : J i ; M j i I : I 1 j i | j ! I j I I I i l j I I | I I i , I I j j ! j i j I I j I i i ! i I ! ; , ! I j I 1 I ■ , ; HAWTHORNES NEW STARTER — 1 Jack Hodgins Return to Chicago After Twelve Years Absence. Assisted in Starting Many Kentucky Derby Fields— Worked Man o War— Sir Barton Race. * When the tall man perched in the starters stand sounds the bell over the stall gate next Monday afternoon— to send away ths first field of the thirty-day Hawthorne meeting — something about his face is certain to seem vaguely familiar to the seasoned regulars of Chicagos racing fraternity. A glance at the program will tell them that the name of Hawthornes new starter is John C. Hodgins. If they are still unable to place him they need only think back some ten or twelve years, before the mu-tuels had replaced the handbooks and racing was just being revived at Hawthorne and Aurora. In those days Jack Hodgins was a raw-boned young assistant starter, with a strong arm, a cool head and a national reputation for being able to make the most unruly horses line up for a start behind the old tape barrier as though they were so many kittens. Not since that time has Jack Hodgins set foot, professionally, on a Chicago race track. But Jack is a native of Illinois — born in Bunker Hill forty years ago-and he says he is glad to be coming back. "I always liked to work on Chicago tracks," Jack admitted in the course of a visit to Arlington last week. "Chicago gets better horses than other sections, and any starter will tell you that the better the class of horses, the better starts he can be sure of." Jack Hodgins has come a long way since the days when racing was making its Chicago comeback, and he has begun to turn a trifle gray in learning all the ins and outs of a job that racing men admit is the hardest one on a race track. His knack of handling difficult horses made him for years the top man in the ground crews of such masters of the starting trade as Jim Milton and Bill Hamilton, and at such widely-sepa-! rated tracks as Havre de Grace. Laurel, Pim-| lico, Churchill Downs, Lexington and La-tonia, to name a few. Since moving into the stand as a starter in his own right Jack has been sending the fields away at such exacting meetings as Oaklawn and Coney Island, among others. He has wrestled with the members of many a Kentucky Derby field, and the list of great horses that he has coaxed and backed and led into position goes back to Man o War. He worked the famous race between Man o War and Sir Barton at Kenilworth, Man o Wars last appearance under colors. And he denies that- the great champion was the bad post horse that many have called him. "I never considered him a bad post horse," Hodgins asserts. "He was an anxious horse that wanted to run as soon as he came on the track, but he could be handled." An interesting sidelight on the Kentucky Derby comes out, too, of his wealth of experience with Derby fields. In recent years, he points out, no really bad post horse has been able to win the Kentucky Derby, no matter how impressive his record had been up to the time of the race. The closest one was Head Play in the 1933 Derby, but the tradition was against him even though he may have been the best horse, and he was beaten by Brokers Tip. Like most modern starters, Hodgins thinks the stall gate is an improvement over the old barrier. Not that it makes for easier starts, but because it protects the good post horses from being kicked or trampled by the bad actors. And, like all starters, he admits that luck plays a part in starting races, even though patience and knowning the individual peculiarities of horses are a big help in getting good starts. "A good many people criticize the starter for delays at the post," this newest mem- ber of Hawthornes official family explained the other afternoon. "What they dont real- ize is that no starter likes delays any more than the spectators do. But he must start every field of horses that is sent to him. Whether they ara model post horses or bad actors, the starter feels he owes it to the public to give each one of them an even break on the start. To the spectator who is watching only one horse, the field may look to be in alignment a dozen times before the bell sounds, but each time there will be one horse taking a forward step or another taking a backward step. It is unfair to the public to send a field away at a time like that." . « .
