How the Fastest Piece of Racing Dirt 

 in This Country Was Secured 



By Tohn W. Linnehan ) 



JUST before the Dorchester Driving 

 Club was chartered, or on May 14, 

 1900. to l>e exact, the first gun was fired 

 by the club members for a permanent 

 speedway for the horsemen of Dorches- 

 ter and vicinity. S. Howard Mildran, a member 

 of the Common Council from Ward 24, intro- 

 duced an order for a speedway on the Talbot 

 Avenue side of Franklin Field. A hearing 

 was given by the Board of Park Commission- 

 ers, after a petition signed by over 2,000 of 

 I'm Eton's most prominent citizens had been 

 presented to them, and they decided that if 

 the Dorchester Driving Club members could 

 secure an appropriation of $25,000 from the 

 City Government to pay for the work of con- 

 struction, they would grant the request of the 

 petition. It was noticed particularly by the 

 members of the committee present that the 

 Commissioners smiled when they announced 

 this decision. 



It was then up to the members of the club 

 to get the special appropriation of $25,000 

 through the City Government and the Mayor's 

 signature attached. Then began some of the 

 finest political work ever pulled off in Boston. 

 My readers must understand that there were 

 seventy-two members in the Common Council 

 and thirteen members in the Board of Alder- 

 men. A majority of the finance committee of 

 both branches of the government had to be in 

 favor of the appropriation before it could be 

 reported out of the committee. Then a ma- 

 jority 1 if both boards, sitting separately, had 

 to be secured to pass the appropriation. 



It would be impossible to mention by names 

 all the members of the City Government that 

 showed their friendship for the driving club 

 while this order was on its way ; but to How- 

 ard Mildran and Herbert Burr, members in 

 the Council from Ward 24, and James M. 

 Curlew now Mayor, and John E. Baldwin, 

 in the Board of Aldermen, the club and Dor- 

 chester citizens owe their speedway. To Ed- 

 ward G. Richardson, at that time the press 

 representative of the club, we also owe much. 

 Assisted by these men, the order passed both 

 branches of the City Government and was 

 signed by Mayor Thomas Hart, late in 1900. 



Then a committee of the Dorchester Club 

 members appeared before the Board of Park 



Commissioners, who. then and there, refused 

 point blank to grant the request of the club, 

 and, when they were reminded that they had 

 premised to grant this request if the club 

 could secure the appropriation of $25,000, 

 they frankly admitted that, at the time they 

 made that promise, they had not the least idea 

 that the club members could get any such ap- 

 propriation through the City Government and 

 that they thought they were perfectly safe in 

 putting the club members off with that prom- 

 ise. 



It was an angry committee which left the 

 Park Commissioners' office, and an angry club 

 membership that met the next Monday night 

 in Central Hall, the club's meeting place at 

 that time. They had the $25,000 appropria- 

 tion, but no place to spend it. 



The fight was then on to prevent this money 

 from being transferred for other purposes 

 until the club members could get the Park 

 Board to see things in a different light. In 

 this matter E. G. Richardson, the City Hall 

 reporter for the Transcript, and press repre- 

 sentative of the club. Aldermen Curley and 

 Baldwin were always on guard, and every 

 time that the Park Board made a move to 

 transfer this money for other purposes than 

 originally intended, Curley or Baldwin blocked 

 their game. 



Things drifted along in a discouraging man- 

 ner until Mayor Collins came up for re-elec- 

 tion in 1902. A committee from the club 

 waited upon him to find out what his disposi- 

 tion was in the matter of compelling the Park 

 Commissioners to grant the club's request. 

 This committee consisted of F. J. Brand, 

 R. K. Clarke. S. Walter Wales, A. S. Gushee, 

 J. W. Linnehan, W. E. Newbert, George H. 

 Greenwood, H. P. Gallup. I. M. 1'".. Morrill. 

 R. S. Fitch. Albert Fellows' and E. G. Rich- 

 ardson. 



When the proposition which the committee 

 had to suggest was put up to Mayor Collins, 

 he turned completely around in his chair and 

 said, "What, a race track on Franklin Field? 

 Why, the old settlers of Dorchester would 

 turn over in their graves at such a thing ; no. 

 no. any place but Franklin Field." 



It was then that the Dorchester Club mem- 

 bers rounded up the South Boston and Ja- 



