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Metcalf Near Old Kentucky Home! Raised in Shadows Of Churchill Downs Trainer of Atoll, Open View Galloped Horses and Broke Yearlings at Tender Age By TOM OREILLY CHURCHILL DOWNS, Louisville, Ky.. May 1. — When the first thoroughbred steps gracefully on to the racing strip and the massed bands strike the stirring notes — I softly, professor, softly — of Stephen Fos- ! ters famed Derby Day come-all-ye, "My j Old Kentucky Home," amid all the tear- ; stained hill-billies from Hollywood and Julep heisting hardboots from Wall Street I there will be at least one participant in the colorful program with a right to feel more at home than most. This is Ray Metcalf. the 46-year-old trainer of Atoll and Open View. All his life, the Derby seemed as natural a holiday to him as July 4th or Christmas to any other American boy. Ray was born and raised right across the street from Churchill Downs. Saw First Derby at 13 Rays father was a railroad man, devoted to the iron horse that ran on rails, but even as a grammer school student, at St. Helens parochial school, in Shivley, Ky., Ray was galloping horses and learning how to break yearlings before he had reached his teens. Metcalf was only 13 years old when he ► saw his first Derby. That was in 1926 when th? late Col. Edward Riley B adleys Bubbling Over and Baganbaggage bred at his Idle Hour Stock Farm made a show of the field. Moreover, he saw it from a vantage point nearest to his heart. He stood on the roof of a barn, along what Kentuckians call "the back-side." Saturday he will watch the same old scene from a box abeam the finish line. We were still in school when we were breaking yearlings at Douglas Park, in Louisville. Old man Ed Trotter, the father of Tobe Trotter, who drowned with Albert Snyder, when they went flshin* off Florida, i was my first teacher and a good one, tco. | He knew everything there was to know about a horse and how to teach it, too." It was while young Metcalf was thus engaged that Mose Goldblatt. trainer for H. P. Whitney, first saw him. Ray was 13 when he hooked on with Goldblatt and went traveling around the mid-west to race at tracks in Kentucky and New Orleans. He stayed with Goldblatt three years then struck out on his own as a rider at the half-milers. He rode at small places like Riverside Park, Ohio and others now forgotten, where a Fair Grounds trainer might say "Break him off at the merry-go-r_und and pull up at the hot dog stand." Three years of that, during which he be- j gan to put on weight, convinced Ray that he would never make a top rider. He is not a big man now. but a solid citizen both in avoirdupois and otherwise. In 1930 he joined John D. Hertzs stable and stayed with Continued on Page 42 D Metcalf at Home at Churchill; Born Across Street From Track Trainer of Atoll, Open View i Galloped Horses and Broke Yearlings at Tender Age Continued from Page 19 D them to race around New York and Chicago for five years. In 1936 he joined up with Phil Reuter, "a Dutchman from Germany," and they had a truly fine horse, remembered by all old timers — Roman Soldier. This horse, purchased for ,500 from Max Hirsch, was by Cohort out of Nimbia and won the Detroit, Aurora, and Texas Derbys before finishing second to Belair Studs Triple Crown winner, Omaha, in the Kentucky Derby. He stayed with Reuter until 1938 when he decided to try racing a public stable by himself. He won the Inaugu: 1 Handicap, at Gulfstream Parks very first opening for racing, with a horse named Shoulder of Arms, owned by Henry Lustigs Long-champs Stable. Gulfstream Parks original opening was not an auspicious one. The track had all sorts of financial difficulties and after only three days of racing the management ended the meeting in a financial shower of red ink. Metcalf headed for Cuba. "I did all right in Cuba," he smiles, "bought a good filly, named Peachy Pie, for myself and parlayed her into a 20 horse stable." He then campaigned in Florida and New England. Metcalf raced a public stable through most of the forties in that time surviving, among other things, the swamp fever epidemic that caught him at Rockingham Park. His best horse in that time was Spangled Game, a handicap performer purchased from the Greentree Stable. He won 0,000 in purses with Spangled Game. Then in 1947 he decided to train for the Mackle Brothers, of Florida building fame. "A friend of mine, Leo Edwards, recom- j mended me to the Mackle brothers," recalls Metcalf. "Christmas was coming in Miami and they wanted a horse for Christmas. Thats why they registered racing colors of Christmas green and red. "By 1953 we had eight horses. We kept improving. We had a 2-year-old Blue Swords filly named Blue Eternal who was a big help. Three years ago we claimed Ifa-body from Brookfield Farm, at Monmouth Park, for ,000, and did well with him. "Then we bred Hubcap by Boodle out of Rub-Adub-Dub and he won us about 7,000. Up until this year, Hubcap was just about the best horse we owned." When the Mackle brothers teamed with Louis Chesler, head of Wall Streets Gener- al Development Corporation, to purchase At~ ll from the Four-Way Ranch, they were really betting on Metcalf s ability. The Four-Way people never thought Atoll would get back to the races. He had a big bandage about one leg. Their price was 00,000. The brothers asked Metcalf if he could do it. "Buy him," he said. The rest is history. It was Metcalf, too, who had the brothers claim Open View, for ,500 from Billy Foales in a race at Monmouth Park last summer. Open View turned out to be a good, consistent horse. Either one of these animals may make Metcalf theKest known trainer in America tomorrow. Oh, the sun shines bright . . . !
