New Jersey: Garth Recalls Good Deed of Telegraph Solar System Spins Odd Wheel of Fate High on Freshening Runners over Jumps, Daily Racing Form, 1957-05-31

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New Jersey By Joe Hirsch Garth Recalls Good Deed of Telegraph Solar System Spins Odd Wheel of Fate High on Freshening Runners Over Jumps . GARDEN STATE PARK, Camden N. J., May 30. The Old Army Game: Over a cup of Gene Moris coffee at the Cherry Hill the other night, Woods Garth was recalling for a man about the time a copy of the Morning Telegraph had done him some good off the race track. "It was back around, 1942 and I was 44 years old when the letter came," Woods noted. "Garden State had opened and I was here with a few horses and I thought they had made a mistake and maybe they wanted my young cousin. But no, it was for me. I was drafted. So I took my basic training at Camp Lee in Virginia and they shipped me to this chemical warfare center in Maryland. Well, I didnt know anything about chemical warfare and couldnt get too excited about it, and to make matters worse, I couldnt get off the base into town. So I asked a sergeant to buy me the Telegraph one Sunday morning and Im sitting on the steps of the barracks when some captain walks by. "Whats that youre reading? he asks, and I tell him. Well, we get to talking about horses and one thing or another and then it turns out he comes from my part of Virginia and he says Why, I know your people. How come youre up at a place like this? So I fill him in and he says to come and see me the next day and I do. He gets me ordered to the remount station at Front Royal, -Virginia, and thats where I spend about half of the 32 months I wore a uniform. Theres a lot of racing people down there like Doc Lee and Laddie Sanford and Johnny Pons and Howard Hausner, who has the Helis horses, and Gerry Smith of The Jockey Club. At last, Im with people who speak the same language I do, which is why Ill always have a warm spot in my heart for the Telegraph." Father Trained Derby Winner Woods grandfather was a noted horseman in his day and his father, William Garth, trained Ral Parrs Paul Jones to win the 1920 Kentucky Derby. Woods went to college at Virginia Poly, played some football, and then joined his dad in the racing business until the elder Garths death in 1933. He had some horses for Brookmeade and some for the famed Admiral Cary Grayson during that period. Eventually, he accumulated a public stable on his own, but times were bad and the mortgage hung heavy over the family home. Garth recalls how he saved the day. "I took a two-year-old named Mister Blaze up to Narragansett in 1936. He could run a little bit and he won the first crack out of the box. So I started him again and he won the second time, too. Then we went to Boston and he won two more races, for four in all. I was betting pretty good in those days, so I wound up with a lot of cash. Then I sold the colt to Johnny Longdens father-in-law, A. G. Tarn, for 5,000, which was once a lot of monev and I was able to pay off all the bills." After Woods got out of the Army, he had some horses for Winlochen Stable, the Bohemia Stable and Sandy McLeod. In the meantime, he had kept a mare named Scottwoods at Mr. and Mrs. L. L: Voight Jr.s Winterton Farm in Flint Hill, Va., and finally sold her to the Voights to get them started in the breeding business. Garth spent the next few seasons breaking yearlings down home and got back to the training end of the business justsa couple of years ago. One of his patrons was Mrs. Voight, and this spring, to illustrate the old saw about casting bread upon water, Woods sent out the three-year-old filly, Solar System, from the mare that he had sold the Voights, to capture the stables first stake, the 5,000 Barbara Frietchie at Bowie. Also Handled Llangollen Youngsters In addition to the Voight horses, Garth took about - a dozen this spring for the Llangollen Farm of Liz Lunn. Several are two-year-olds and Woods is going easy with them, as there are some promising fillies by Your Host -and Bimelech and Liz stallion Endeavour II. He also has several older horses whove won recently, horses like Night Mission and Get Lost, who have been schooled over the jumps. You may recall that when Cain Hoys Flying Fury, the Derby Trial winner of 1955, went sour, he hurdled at Monmouth Park last summer and seemed to take a new interest in his career. He came back to record a smashing victory in the 0,000 Manhattan Handicap at a mile and a half at Belmont last fall. So Woods has a high opinion of freshening runners over the jumps, almost as high as he does of the Telegraph, which jumped him from chemical warfare to the more amenable atmosphere of the remount. Around the Track: Eugene Constantin, the Texas patron who raced the fine stakes winner, Royal Bay Gem, arrived from Dallas with Mrs. Constanin for a few days of sport. He has horses here with Stanley Greene. . . . Jimmy Jones is tentatively planning to send last years two-year-old champion, Barbizon, to Delaware Park for Saturdays 5,000 Kent at a mile and a sixteenth. . . . Garth reveals that Solar System has been bred to the Preakness winnerFaultless, who stands at Dutch Ellis Dhu Varren Farm, Far Hills, N. J. The Continued on Page Fifty -One NEW JERSEY By JOE HIRSCH Continued from Page Seven mare will be retired at the conclusion of the New Jersey racing season. . . . Former jockey Don Zarzecki has taken over the engagement book of Jess Higley. . . . Bill La Rue has named B. A. Darios Venomous for the 0,000 Regret at Monmouth Park on June 22, a race at her favorite six-furlong distance. John Block, 18-year-old brother of jockey Henry Block, made his debut in yesterdays sixth race. John is under contract to Bohemia Stable, as was Henry at one time. . . . William Hal Bishop reached in the, claiming box for three more horses yesterday, which means hes haltered 7,500 worth of stock at this session. . . . Angel Valenzuela will be here Saturday to handle Chris Chenerys Third Brother against Bardstown and others in the 0,000 Camden Handicap. Charley Sonborn shipped Horace Wade the colt to Lexington, Ky., for a freshener. . . . John Nerud has a lot of respect for Bold Ruler, whom hell hook up in the Belmont with Ralph Lowes Gallant Man: "Hes the only one to come through all the wars Florida Kentucky, Maryland," says the astute Nerud. . . . Bill Hinphy, who saddled his promising young filly, Little Mullen, in todays fifth race, and jockey Paul Bohenko, flew back to Suffolk Downs with trainer Bill Rodgers. . . . Roger Leblanc reports from Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden, that he can walk around a bit with a special, brace on his back. George Allen and George Humphrey were both visitors yesterday. . . . Crossland, who won his second easy race yesterday, may make a nice colt for Mrs. Markey this fall or next season.


Persistent Link: https://drf.uky.edu/catalog/1950s/drf1957053101/drf1957053101_7_2
Local Identifier: drf1957053101_7_2
Library of Congress Record: https://lccn.loc.gov/unk82075800