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Ascot Park J. R. Batty ■ Racing Well Represented in Ed Bang Tribute Sports Editor Honored on His 75th Birthday Ascot Employe Once Known as Akron Flash ASCOT PARK, Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, April 30.— The sporting fraternity gathered 900 strong in Clevelands Statler Hotel Thursday evening to pay public homage to Ed Bang, veteran sports editor of the Cleveland News, who recently celebrated his 75th birthday. It was a plush 0 a plate affair and racing was generously represented in the jam-packed ballroom. Bang has long been a strong booster of racing, and many of his Just Between You and Me columns during the past 48 years have been devoted to the thoroughbred sport. Ascot Park, Randall Park, ThistleDown and Cranwood all purchased full tables for the affair. Representing Ascot were president Horace Adams, general manager Pete ODonnell, stewards Larry Bogenschutz and Harold Morrison, racing secretary Charley Henry, placing judge William Mills, mu-tuel manager Earl Swain and publicity director Bud Fisher. Representing Randall Park was general manager Elmer F. Vickers, Jr., and Paul C. Warren, director of public relations who was a member of the committee in charge of arrangements for the dinner. General manager Lou Pondfield and president Henry Gottfried represented ThistleDown and Cranwood. At the speakers table Zoltan Gombos, chairman of the Ohio Racing Commission, represented the thoroughbred sport. Henry Green, until this year, one of the operators of Ascot Park and River Downs, and Tony Webner, who served as publicity director at the two tracks, were also in attendance. Raise 5,000 for Scholarship Fund In recognition of Bangs contribution to the community guests contributed to a scholarship fund to finance worthy Clevelanders at the Ohio State School of Journalism. More thai: £3,000 was raised. He was also presented with accommodations for a trip to Paris. Bang is the father of Chuck Bang who mans the public address system at all tracks in the Cleveland area and does publicity at Painesville, Randall and Tropical Park. Among hundreds of telegrams received at the banquet were one from President Dwight D. Eisenhower and another from Saul Silberman and Ralph Dechiaro, owners of* Randall Park and Tropical Park. The guard on the mezzanine floor of the" grandstand might look a little soft at sfirst glance but we advise against choosing him for a round or two. His name is Johnny Griffiths, or "the Akron Flash." Griffiths is a former lightweight and welterweight boxer and during his 15 years in the ring, from the period of 1910 to 1925, fought the best. The list includes Jack Britton, Ted "Kid" Lewis, Leach Cross and Freddie Welch. He says it was nothing to go 20 rounds in his days. . . . Russell Fisher reports he has sold his Sunny View Farm, in Dayton, Ohio. Fisher, a retired soft drink distributor, announced he has purchased a house at Tarpon Springs, Fla., arid will call that place home for a while. Fisher is campaigning seven horses here under the care of Bennie Myres. W. E. Russell to Race Unit at River Downs W. E. Russell, who has the Hi Acres Stock Farm menage under his care here, reports the string, numbering nine head, will finish out he local session and then go to River Downs, where a 44-day meeting opens May 27. . . . Glenn "Red" Laird, of Confirmation Photos, Inc., checked in from Baltimore, Md. His photo finish camera is used by all the tracks in the Cleveland area. Accompanying Laird was Ronald Mooney, who just recently joined the firm and will journey to Fort Miami, at Toledo, Ohio, to finish out that meeting as operator of the photo finish camera. . . . Trainer Bob Myers, who has a mixed stable and a few racing in his own interest, leaves for Waterford Park after the close here on May 21. . . . Charley Billeaud is the first jockey to have ridden over 100 mounts at the meeting, according to the press box statistical department, maintained by Bill Griffiths and Bud Fisher. They report Billeaud won with 10 of these. Larry Bogenschutz, a steward here, reports he is working on the first issue of the book of conditions for the River Downs meeting. Bogenschutz who will serve as racing secretary- and handicapper at the Hamilton County course near Cincinnati, has drafted conditions for the opening 11 days of that 44-day session, which gets under way May 27. The genial Cincinnati official added that horsemen will be notified beginning next week of approval of. their stall applications at the southern Ohio course. . . . Tony Webner, former publicity director at this track, Beulah Park and River Downs, was a press box visitor Friday. Webner is now affiliated with Goodyear Rubber Co. in Akron. . . . Horace Adams, whose bad luck at the mutuel windows has been phenomenal, finally cashed a ticket. In fact he wagered on two winners Thursday, trekking to the press box to break the jinx.
