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Jolly Roger
“No white feet, ride him for your life/One white foot, give him to your wife/Two white feet, keep him not a day/Three white feet, sell him far away/Four white feet and a white nose, cut off his head and give him to the crows.” So goes a jocular rhyme, alluding to the supposed weakness of a white foot as opposed to a dark-colored hoof. But apparently the anonymous rhymester never met Jolly Roger. Liberally marked with white up all four legs and with a huge blaze, Jolly Roger was nonetheless as hardy and honest a steeplechaser as ever raced and a huge crowd favorite, not least due to his flashy markings. When the white-stockinged chestnut colt first struggled to his feet in 1922, he was already marked as a potential ‘chasing prospect, with good reason. Although he was a son of the noted flat-race sire Pennant, his dam Lethe was a daughter of the top hurdle mare Forget and a half sister to the good ‘chaser Hylas. Sold by breeder Harry Payne Whitney to his sister Helen Hay Whitney’s Greentree Stable – then almost exclusively a steeplechasing operation – as a yearling, he was trained by Vincent Powers, the country’s leading steeplechase jockey in 1917. Jolly Roger raced on the flat as a two-year-old, winning one race in Canada and earning no great distinction. But he showed promise early once converted to steeplechasing and was a stakes winner before the end of his three-year-old season, winning the Elkridge Steeplechase. He was better at four, winning the Wheatley and Wingfield steeplechases and placing in three other events. But at five he was best of all, winning six of eight races and finishing second in the other two. He earned $63,075 that year, an unheard-of seasonal total for a steeplechaser, and his victories included the Charles L. Appleton, Corinthian, and Brook steeplechases. He also won the American Grand National under 165 pounds, defeating his chief rival for leadership of the division, Fairmount. In fairness to Fairmount, however, the Fair Play gelding had gotten much the worst of a chaotic start. Some ten false starts were recorded for the 1927 Grand National, and the high-strung Fairmount was away with the leaders each time, at one point nearly reaching the first fence before he could be pulled up. Jolly Roger, a quiet and easily handled sort, had been checked much more easily and was far fresher than his lathered rival when the race officially began. When the leg-weary Fairmount hit the top rail at the third backstretch jump, Jolly Roger had clear sailing. Fairmount, who was conceding two pounds to Jolly Roger, ran second despite his misfortunes and later got his revenge in the Temple Gwathmey Steeplechase, winning easily; he would defeat Jolly Roger twice more in the Gwathmey before finishing his career. Jolly Roger was never out of the money as a six-year-old in 1928, winning three of his seven starts including the American Grand National Steeplechase under 167 pounds. He was probably not as good as he had been in 1927, however, as his other victories were in relatively minor events and he twice ran second to horses that would not have been in the same flight with him the year before, albeit while making huge weight concessions. In 1929 he showed further evidence of decline, failing to win in four starts although he finished second once and third in his other three starts. The big gelding recovered for a last hurrah in 1930 at the age of eight, racing to two victories and three placings. He won the North American and Glendale steeplechases, in the latter defeating the good German import *Laufjunge, and ran second to *Laufjunge in the Wheatley Steeplechase. The $12,325 he earned as an eight-year-old made him the world’s leading money-winning steeplechaser with a total bankroll of $143,240, and he retired with eighteen wins, nine seconds, and nine thirds from forty-nine starts. Jolly Roger’s earning days were not quite over, however, although his employment was somewhat unorthodox. Following his retirement to Greentree, the big chestnut became an unwitting part of a benign scam conducted by the children of various farm employees at the expense of the farm’s more naive visitors. Once the youngsters had ascertained that the guest didn’t know one horse from another, they would ask what famous horse the trusting visitor wanted to see. No matter what the answer, one of the children would then go out and catch gentle old Jolly Roger – who, as Joe Palmer later said, was shown about as much as any horse in Kentucky, though seldom under his own name – and show him off to the visitor. The act was usually good for a quarter or so to the child who had caught Jolly Roger and led him over, and the horse undoubtedly racked up a fair amount of pocket money for the young conspirators through this clandestine employment. The old champion spent his declining years as one of a quartet of pensioners known to baseball-addicted farm employees as the “Gas House Gang” after the famed St. Louis Cardinals pitching battery. The other members of the equine Gas House Gang were Easter Hero, the same that bollixed up the field by landing atop a fence in the memorable Grand National Steeplechase of 1928; the sterile Kentucky Derby and Belmont winner Twenty Grand; and Cherry Pie, a good stakes horse in his day and a personal favorite of Mrs. Whitney. For years the four grazed the green fields together, perhaps exchanging memories of their days of glory. But time ends all earthly associations, and so it was with the Gas House Gang. Cherry Pie was the first to go, passing on in 1947. Easter Hero rose to his last fence in February 1948, and Twenty Grand crossed the final wire in March of the same year. But Jolly Roger lived on. Then, on July 2, 1948, ten-year-old Elkridge took down the $8800 winners’ purse of the Indian River Steeplechase at Delaware Park to set a new world earnings record for steeplechasers. The following day, Jolly Roger died and was buried at Greentree near the graves of his old companions. © 2005 by Avalyn Hunter |
