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DAILY DISTRIBUTION OF ,268 Wheeling Downs to Stage Eight-Race Programs on Saturdays and Decoration Day. WHEELING, W. Va., May 18— Eight-race programs have been arranged for four Saturdays and Decoration Day and seven-event cards during the other eleven days of the spring meeting of the West Virginia Jockey Club at Wheeling Downs, it was announced today by the racing secretary. There will be a daily purse distribution of an average of ,268. The first session of the thoroughbreds of the 1939 season for the Wheeling track will be made up of three five-day weeks and the opening Saturday. Sport will be conducted on the Monday preceding Memorial Day, May 30, but following the holiday, Wednesday, will find the plant idle. The next program will be arranged for Thursday, June 1. The mid-week suspension of activities was arranged to continue the custom of five-day racing inaugurated here last spring. The last two weeks of the meeting will find the runners on the track every afternoon from Tuesday through to Saturday. In all there will be 117 races with a feature event each day carrying 00 purses. All other races will be for 00 purses. The last brush-wielding job starts tomorrow morning when the ground crew begins whitewashing the centerfield rail. That will be 2,620 feet of railing plus a few hundred posts. When this job is finished the stage will be ready for the runners. It will be the I earliest the island oval has been ready for the first bugle call in many meetings.
