CHAMPION TWO-YEAR-OLD. 117 



eclipse Sweetheart's triumph. We were handicapped 

 by Crocker's having a bad leg, and we had to proceed 

 cautiously ; and finally the leg gave way altogether, 

 but not until he had done what was asked of him. So, 

 on the day that Elaine raced with Santa Claus, we 

 started Crocker to beat 2:30, and he did it in 2:28^, and 

 a week later — November 20th — he started to beat 

 2:28J, and not only did that, but broke Sweetheart's 

 record, trotting the mile at the third attempt in 2:25^, 

 and he was at once the sensation of the day. Palo 

 Alto had achieved its first great triumph as a " nursery 

 of trotters," and Electioneer had given thus early an 

 earnest of what he would accomplish with time and 

 opportunity as a producer of phenomenal trotting- 

 speed. Still no one dreamed then that the triumphs 

 of Palo Alto would be what they have been — no one 

 dreamed that Fred Crocker was a forerunner of that 

 glorious host of record-breakers that have so irresisti- 

 bly demonstrated the greatness of its blood and the 

 fitness of its methods of breeding and training. 



