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PLANS FOR WHEELING MEETING Total of 6,700 to Be Distributed During Sixteen-Day Session — Card Distance Races. WHEELING, W. Va., May 12— The West Virginia Jockey Club will distribute 6,700 in purses during the sixteen-day spring meeting at Wheeling Downs. Racing secretary William Shewbridge announced the first half of his condition book today. The races for the first eight days of the meeting opening May 27 should be very attractive to the many horsemen who will race at the Island ctfurge. Shewbridge, whose work here last fall won high praise of owners and fans alike, has carded two and three distance races daily. On Decoration Day, when eight events will be held, half of the contests will be waged over routes ranging from one and one-six- teenth to one and one-eighth miles. The Memorial Day Handicap will be forj "three-year-olds and upward at a mile and a , sixteenth and will have a companion feature in the McLure Hotel purse designed to bring the best three-year-olds into action for a six and one-half furlongs dash. While the usual short distances of five and six and one-half furlongs, in vogue since 1937, have been sprinkled liberally through Shew-bridges program, the fans will get their first big session of excitement when starter Dick-erson sends a field of four-year-olds and upward a mile and five-sixteenths on the second Saturday of the meeting. There will be a special feature daily, named in honor of the many organizations planning to hold special outings at Wheeling Downs. The first group to the fete will be the West Virginia Turf Club, whose handicap heads the inaugural program. The Dapper Dan Purse, an allowance affair, also for three-year-olds and upward, will feature racing on the only Monday card arranged for the spring season. The race is set for six and one-half furlongs.
