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JAMAICA L I N Y May 4 MONDAY Up at last after nearly a week of sniffling virus Dr J Kilgallen sent me home from the track last week in one of J OBriens luxurious Pinkerton limousines but its a lousy way to feel elegant In the mail a copy of J McCallums tome That Kelly Family Barnes395 a must for all fans of Grace Jack George and Walter C This should make a great movie some day Pointed a tentative toe toward Jamai ¬ ca reading en route how Y Berras 10th inning homer beat the Red Sox Surprised at the crowd of 26000 but E Arcaro re ¬ minded me in the jocks room that Mon ¬ day always has been a big racing day For one thing many fancy Manhattan restau ¬ rants are closed Mondays and all waiters are inveterate horseplayers Shocked by the press box baseball scuttlebutt Was told the real reason OMalley wants to leave Brooklyn is the rowdyism of the fans Many bring bottles of muscatel called Sneaky Pete in paper bags and by the late innings the shouted comments and other antics would curl hair Who remem ¬ bers the ancient riddle about the two old dames with an empty bottle in a box at Ebbetts Field The question Whats the score The answer Its the end of the fifth and the bags are loaded The entire press box played Nan Hiss 410 owned by our pal cleaning man J Schwartz so we all went home rich A light supper and long walk with Miss Lace Curtain she had no lomework whose new Bassett hound Gregory Peck now can go upstairs Has trouble coming down though the second section often trying to pass the first Some reading and so to bed bedA A A ATUESDAY TUESDAY Up betimes and as I climbed into a cab for Penh station an Oriental jentleman named Harry who is the num er one chocolate soda customer in Sav areses drug store stepped from the curb o give me Pro Bono in the 7th Since Harry is a first class kitchen handicapper studies the charts all night I played him and brought off a 1470 mutuel Riding o the course E Farrell told of Sister Dominick Clare the Dominican nun who is up at 5 am in nearby Mary Immaculate lospitals emergency ward before taking ler charity post at the track Seems that the gejitle sister has been at Jamaica so long she sometimes talks like a racetrack er Calls the place Pneumonia Hall and when Eddie asked her age for Miss Ryan in Dr Kilgallens office she replied softly No dice Ive been a nun 40 years You take it from there Did my stint and then home to a quiet dinner and read R Bis sells new book Say Darling Little Brown395 An amusing tale obviously written around his experiences as co ¬ author of the Broadway hit The Pajama Game Bissells gags are none too hot but he has a great ear for dialogue And so sweet Morpheus MorpheusA A A A AWEDNESDAY WEDNESDAY Up betimes and riding to the course read of Belle Bakers passing Hers was the highest paid vaudeville act ever to play Lancasters Pa Colonial Theatre She knocked the Mennonites and Amish deader than usual with put it on take it off wrap it up and take it home It was good to see E Shipman up and about again at the course Much talk of the Kentucky Derby and commiserating with jockey J Choquette set down 10 days for rough riding thus missing his chance with Gallant Man at Churchill Downs Outwardly this 24yearold took it in good form with a sad smile and a shrug Hell do his 10 in Florida Ancient S Sully asked about the Derby cackled Fitzsimmons FitzsimmonsContinued Continued on Page FortyFour OReilly on Racing Continued from Page Three Threeo o course I did good with him when he was racin 500 horses I aint gonna move away from him now Then he added jovially Lets go down in the paddock an see who needs money docker P Adams gave me Flying Bird 760 in the fourth So Shipman and I had a real mantilla and castanet dinner at the Jai Alai in Green ¬ wich Village Home in time to hear S Ellis broadcast the RobinsonFullmer fight in Chicago The crowds cheering was at a crescendo and the referee had hardly croaked ten over Fullmer when the sponsor cut in with a long commercial Wonder what would happen if they tugged a mans elbow and tried to turn him away from it all at ringside So to bed dreaming of hooks and crosses THURSDAY Up to some glorious rac ¬ ing weather which it is hoped will hold for the Derby Resolved not to attempt watching the Derby on the TV set in the jocks room So much hollering and jump ¬ ing about that nobody can hear the an ¬ nouncer tell the positions of the horses En route to Jamaica read O Prescotts review of W Faulkners new novel The Town Puzzled by my inability to read Faulkner came across this comment Clumsy as it is in structure flawed as it is with its authors peculiar manner ¬ isms The Town is frequently enjoyable and entertaining As Bert Williams used to sing its entertaining for Somebody Else Not Me Amused at the tizzy caused when Sergei Denham lowered the curtain at the height of Mme Alexandra Dani lovas ballet performance at the Met Two more minutes and all the union hands would have demanded overtime How artists suffer Reminded of the time I pro ¬ posed to meet a millionaire at 7 pm but he insisted on 630 Otherwise he wouldnt have been able to leave his own building since the elevator men quit at 630 Lunched in the clubhouse with K Powell the tote matt and P OBrien ye drum beater S Lewis the veteran tunesmith My Little Girl In a Spanish Town etc told me his new teeth are killing him but hes written a sweet new song just the same Clocker P Adams gave me Leonardian 960 in the fifth but I gave it all back on Conty Bay in the eighth Mustnt get greedy En route to town bought four 15cent chances on boxes of candy from my favorite railroad hustler but got nowhere An enormous fat man squeezing me half out the window and a lady in front of me both collected A light supper at Schraffts where the bouncer wears a paisley shawl and then to La Strada a wonderful Italian movie at the 51st Street TransLux So home and the hay hayA A A AFRIDAY FRIDAY Lay late and over breakfast read J Fitzsimmons Derby memoir in the Saturday Evening Post with J Breslin Methinks the headline writer was a l it hard on the race In the mail a Dear sir you cur note from W Loader Louisville radioTV exec furious at my comments on those hilarious early Derby radio broadcasts Apparently Loader loathes New Yorkers since Mel Allen born and raised in Alabama did the Derby TV color a few years back and mistakenly put Louisville on the Mississippi River If a soft answer turneth away wrath heres one for Loader Down boy Did my stint then by overhead highway to the office passing en route the navy carrier Valley Forge docked off the fifties Hung around watching S Rosen L ODonnell E Berger and F Grossman sweating out the big Der ¬ by edition Found my own sweet self in the middle of Pebs wonderful Churchill Downs crowd drawing To dinner at the press box owned by the unholy three F Manfredi H Stone and H Costello in east 45th with the L Carvers and L Eisenbergs Mrs Eisenberg is the beauteous B Carver now one of Philadelphias Rittenhouse Square matrons with a summer place and boat in Atlantic Citys Margate Lloyd is a former Duke tackle Much talk of the new trotting group planning a 5500000 track in Sulli ¬ van County It includes W Naden trout fisherman extraordinary and executive VP of Esso J Quinn of the WalshPerini Milwaukee Braves Const Co C Rice ex Princeton gridder and VP of the Empire Trust Co J Gaines of Lexingtons Gainesway breeding farms S Mosberg ex Olympic boxing champ and many others A classy crew quite up to commissioner G Monaghans high standards Home to bed to read W Lords Day of Infamy a great reporting job And so to bed to dream of Iron Liege winning the Derby DerbyA A A A ASATURDAY SATURDAY Up betimes to damp gray weather Riding to the course couldnt help but think that anybody at Jamaica on Derby Day must feel like a second ¬ hand rose So there were over 35000 on hand Noticing Tottela which meanslit tle father entered on Mondays card L ONeill cracked If they keep running these horses with Yiddish names BenGurion may have to replace Caposella as an ¬ nouncer Thus far this season in addi ¬ tion to Tottela there have been Yiddish horses named Rosie Layben sweet life Nisht Amool never again Nah Hiss pleasure Greda Maza good luck Zeiss Kinnd sweet child and Mazoldick lucky among others The press box TV set in ¬ stalled personally by B Horwood for the Derby featured the Cardinals and Dodgers At lunch in the clubhouse met the charm ¬ ing Mrs H Fontaine who revealed she and her famed hubby flew in from Florida to see D H Stables Pardala in the Bed o Roses Played three stiffs in a row and if I donfc get a winner soon Ill be in a bed of neuroses So endeth another week of my daze Trala
