Wire? What's a wire? Something taped to an informant's chest? No, a telegraph wire. The first Web, the first Tweets. The precursor to the Racing Form was a Triangle publication called The Morning Telegraph, a massive broadsheet that was of course devoted to racing and its past performances. The paper was so wide you could wrap several days' worth of fish in it when you where done. It was 75 cents when I started going to the track nearly 50 years ago, when the daily papers hovered around 15 cents. It was an investment.
Walter Annenberg and Triangle Publications made a fortune with TV Guide, and The Morning Telgrapgh. Annenberg was tapped into America's interests: TV and horse racing. Henry Bomze tapped into the racing and sports side of things with a magazine called American Turf Monthly, featuring the non-existent Ray Talbot as the house reporter and handicapper. His two sons, Eddie and Richie developed Sports Reporter, Winning Points, and Racing Star Weekly.
These were publications with their own stable of writers. Howard Rowe was the mentor to my friend when he joined Richie and Racing Star Weekly and Sports Reporter soon after leaving college with a journalism degree.
Tom Ainslie was part of the crowd. That was the pseudonym used by Richard Carter, a man who won a George Polk award for a newspaper series about waterfront crime, and who wrote a biography of Jonas Salk that is still available online. And perhaps the most notable book be put together was Tom Ainslie's Guide to Thoroughbred Racing, an indispensable primer of learning about the sport and the intricacies of handicapping. I still have my edition, with dust jacket.
Into this stable my friend was admitted and excelled at following the "bush" tracks, the minor league circuit that is still prevalent in this country. I think anyone who might sign onto a Daily Racing Form website would be astounded at the number of tracks that are operating on a given day, and that you can get information on who's running and who's won.
If there wasn't a current Daily Racing Form, a descendant of The Morning Telegraph, now owned by a private group, I can't imagine that there would be much interest, as little as there now seems to be, on racing. There would certainly be no wagering, because the Racing Form is equal to a Stand & Poor's rating on horses. No information, no wagering. No industry.
Richard Bomze's interests were the publications, betting, and eventually owning horses himself. He was chairmen of the New York Breeders Fund, and owned several top New York Breds when that program was first launched.
My friend worked on two of the publications, Racing Star and Sports Reporter. Horses that my friend felt were ready to "pop" were listed at their home tracks. Going to college in Kentucky he developed an affinity for Miles, Ellis and Turfway Parks. From those venues horses shipped in from other Midwest tracks. Thus, you were exposed to a flow of horses across several state lines. You had to know more than just one track.
The publication wasn't a daily one, so you had to follow the highlighted horses and watch for their entry, generally at the rack named, but could really be almost anywhere on certain circuits.
The other input my friend provided was to pick college football games for the college portion of Sports Reporter. Pro and football games were analyzed. Richie wrote the pro narratives, and my friend could award one to five stars on college games. Five stars were reserved for the mortal locks. But my friend didn't believe any game was a mortal lock, so the highest he would go would be a four star rating.
Richie was to tease him that he was a chicken by not going completely out on a limb, so when the day began on Friday my friend was always teased by Richie, "Got any four star games, Dave?"
Richard Bomze owned several New York Breds, his most famous of course was Fourstardave, the first New York Bred to win a $1 million. Bomze bred horses, and owned several mares and stallions, notably Compliance, Dave's sire.
In 1997 one of Bomze's horses won the 1997 Yaddo Handicap at Saratoga by a nose, Junior Pitchunia, paying a win price somewhere in the $60 range. Richie had bred the horse, owning the mare Pitchoune to his sire Compliance. News of this coup spread, and there were stories of money squirting out of people's hands. I think a copy of the winners' circle photo is in The Wishing Well Restaurant in Saratoga Springs.
Since Richie bred his own horses, he got to name them. Often, the names emanated from his family, or people on his staff. At one end there was a horse named Dumb Donna, to the most famous, Fourstardave, named after my friend Dave and the stars he awarded to his picks.
Fourdtardave as a horse was a gelding, so he continued with a successful career winning grass races. He won the Daryl's Joy handicap at Saratoga two years in a row in 1990 and 1991. In 1996 the race was renamed to honor Fourstardave and is now considered to have been run 31 times, which include the times it was the Daryl's Joy Handicap.
Richard Bomze passed away last year, but even after his retirement, he and his wife Diane would be seen making the award presentation after the Fourstardave handicap.
NYRA is on a campaign to memorialize its heroes. Yesterday was H. Allen Jerkens Day in honor of the legendary trainer who passed away this year. NYYA has inducted Jerkens, and a few others into its new Walk of Fame exhibit at Saratoga, and has plan for other inductees.
Yesterday, Leo O'Brien, a former steeplechase rider and Fourstardave's trainer, and Richard Migliore, a now retired frequent jockey of Dave's made the award presentation in the winner's circle.
For years now there was been a commemoratively named Fourstardave Way street outside of the restaurant Siro's, across the street from the track. I've taken many pictures of that.
NYRA even had a contest to name it's newly renovated Lower Carousel level sports bar area after one of five horses' names they put on a ballot. The fans overwhelmingly picked Fourstardave for the horse that was known as "The Sultan of Saratoga" and who won at least one race at the Spa from 1987 to 1994.
The Dave of the horse's namesake is still with us and is forever reminded by his brother and myself that we had to pull him out of bed to get him to attend the 1968 Belmont Stakes, our personal Maiden Special Weight appearance at the races, Morning Telegraph's in tow. (Only two of them. I don't think Dave made the investment.)
Dave occasionally makes a trip to the races these days, or passes a few bucks through myself and one of my Advance Deposit Accounts, but if you want the absolute ultimate in irony, consider this.
The person who is Dave and the namesake of the horse has NEVER been to Saratoga.
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