view raw text
PurSang Interesting Lincoln Candidate Last Years Peabody Winner Is Result of an Inbreeding Experiment to Jeanne Bowdre HAWTHORNE, Cicero, HI., June 10. — The fact that Reuben Kowalls four-year-old colt, Pur Sang, will come to Hawthorne for the Lincoln Handicap next Saturday lends considerable interest to that mile and a quarter fixture which, traditionally, is the closing-day feature of Lincoln Fields meetings. Pur Sang was assigned 107 pounds by racing secretary Larry Bogenschutz, which is nine less than the topweighted Volcanic, under 116, and three more than the 104-pound bottom for Fair Appraisal, Chall-cote, and Able Sirte. Last year at three, Pur Sang took up scale weight, 126 pounds, for his age, and won the Peabody Memorial Stakes, beating Royal Mustang and Ruhe, the same horses who had finished second and third to Count Turf in the Kentucky Derby a few weeks previously. After giving considerable promise in early races Pur Sang, at two, won the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes of 1950 at the direct expense of the fast Bernwood and Mameluke. Pur Sang was somewhat of an experiment of inbreeding to the great producer, Jeanne Bowdre, foundation mare of the late Jack Keenes Keeneland Stud, at Lexington, Ky. He was bred by Keenes nephew, Keene Van Houten-Gurnee, at the historic estate which came into possession of the Keene family in the eighteenth century while Kentucky was still a part of the state of Virginia. First Foal by Side Boy Pur Sang is the first foal got by the black Side Boy, himself a foal by the venerable Jean Valjean, a son of Jeanne Bowdre. Pur Sangs dam is Contrary Mary, whose sire Grand Slam by Chance Play also is a son of Jean Bowdre. Through the matriarch. Jeanne Bowdre, and also through his sires dam, Emma Dear, Pur Sang carries several crosses to Domino, Americas greatest source of sheer speed. From the outset, Pur Sang justified the confidence of his young breeder, Gurnee. who, incidentally, also bred the fast colt, Oh Leo. Pur Sang was broken and developed by the well known Kentucky trainer. Tom B. Young. After winning several races at two, the chestnut colt was sold to Ko-wall, a Detroit hotel man, prior to the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes in the fall of 1950. That, and his Peabody Memorial, have been his most important victories. Since early in his three-year-old form, Pur Sang has been trained by John Zoeller, who had him a fit horse for the Peabody Memorial victory. This year, %t four, Pur Sang has won an allowance race at Golden Gate, but was beaten three and one-half lengths by the sensational filly, Sickles Image, at Detroit on May 30, but came back last Saturday to score a clever victory over the same filly at the Motor City. There is another Lincoln Handicap nominee at Detroit. This one is the six-year-old mare, Our Request, owned jointly by her trainer, George C. White and E. W. Thomas, who bred her in partnership. Our Request won the Louisville Handicap last year, also placed in the Falls City Handicap at Churchill Downs and the Olympic Handicap at Atlantic City. She has been assigned 110 pounds for the Lincoln Handicap. Besides Pur Sang; Our Request; the highweight, Volcanic, and the three bottom weights, Fair Appraisal, Challcote and Able Sirte, assignments for the other Lincoln nominees are as follows: Hasty House Farms Ruhe, 113; Seaward, 111, and Inseparable, 110; Mikel Farms False, 109; Sam E. Wilson, Jr.s, Air Mail, 108; M. A. and Roy Saf firs Dr. Ole Nelson, 108; N. G. Bouchards Can Locate, 106; Mrs. Herbert Herffs Screemin Jack, 106; B. W. Landys Plunger, 105. The latter and Able Sirte are three-year-olds; the others older.
