226 



The Driving Clubs of Greater Boston 



charge of the new Metropolitan Club stable 

 at the speedway. 



Mr. Ralston was one of the first members 

 of the Metropolitan Club, and has been 

 prominent in its matinee affairs. Besides his 

 amateur racing. Mr. Ralston each season takes 

 a few weeks in visiting the local half-mile 

 tracks with a select string of trotters and 

 pacers, and usually with success. He is 

 known as an expert in the development of 

 young speed, and is partial, himself, in getting 

 hold of a colt, and then watching him improve. 



Among the horses Mr. Ralston has de- 

 veloped anil driven to records are the follow- 

 ing: Ella Hal. 2:151-2; Miss Adbell, 

 2:061-4: Ethel Direct, 2:113-4; Luzaro, 

 2:181-4; Tony G., 2:181-4; Lord Quex, 

 2:101-2; Susie Star, 2:21 1-2; Genevieve, 

 2:181-4; Yates, 2-171-2; Little Bill. 

 2:20 1-4; Wavelite, 2:24 1-4; Pee Wee, 

 2:281-4; Nelson, 2:251-4; My Chance, 

 2:171-4, etc. Mr. Ralston resides in Brigh- 

 ton, Mass. 



L. FRED SANBCRN 



L. Fred Sanborn, now of Medford, Mass., 

 and until recently an active member of the 

 Metropolitan and Fellsway Driving Clubs, 

 was born in Danvers, Mass., in 1879. His 

 father, in Fred's boyhood days, generally had 

 a road horse, but when Fred was about fifteen 

 his father bought Dinah Wilkes, 2 :33, a trot- 

 ter who could hold her own in a brush to either 

 dirt or snow. Soon after her purchase the 

 Salem News "Man About Town" quoted May- 

 or Peterson, of Salem, as telling his friends 

 how a boy with a black mare beat him on 

 the Danvers road. 



Later, the Salem News, in a front page ar- 

 ticle, told of a runaway through Danvers 

 Square, in which a Concord buggy was over- 

 turned on top of a boy who clung to the reins 

 after being pulled to his feet by the runaway 

 horse, righted the buggy with one hand, suc- 

 ceeded in stopping the horse, and drove leis- 

 urely back through the square as if nothing 

 had happened. 



Fred's first horse of his own was a road 

 mare who pulled two men to a buggy, a sur- 

 veyed mile, on the road in three minutes. 

 Next he bought an erratic green trotter, which 

 Fred couldn't keep on a trot, hut Knapp 

 Forshner drove a quarter on the back-stretch 

 of Old Mystic in 32 1-2 seconds. Then 

 Colonel, 2:18 1-4, a sore-toed pacer, was pur- 

 chased, and on the first snowfall, Fred, in a 

 newly purchased Perrin sleigh, started for 

 the Charles River Speedway on a Saturday 

 afternoon all by his lonesome, the result be- 

 ing featured in Sunday's Boston Herald, "Un- 



known young man with a horse, later identi- 

 fied as Colonel. 2:181-4, cleans up all com- 

 ers on Charles River snowpath." 



Colonel was pensioned for life and Robin- 

 bird, 2:29 1-4, purchased from Albert H. Mer- 

 rill, the Danvers speed merchant, a boyhood 

 neighbor of Fred's, as was also purchased 

 Billy J., 2:17 1-4, Fred C, 2:11 1-4, etc. Billy 

 J. won three cups for Fred, stepping the half- 

 mile track at Combination Park in 1 :o5, and 

 the Charles River Speedway a fast heat, one 

 season, in 1 :02, and winning the fastest two 

 heats in another series in 1 :o2 1-4 and 1 :o2 1-2. 

 Fred C. 2:11 1-4, record over a half-mile 

 track, was bought at a Chicago sale, at a long 

 price, as he had trotted the fastest mile in a 

 race over any half-mile track in the country, 

 the previous season. However, Fred C. 

 proved to be a better mile horse than a half 

 mile one, and he was sold to go to England, 

 where he made a new trotting record for that 

 country and raced with fair success some 

 twenty-four races there, the following season, 

 against hoppled pacers. 



With Luther Moko, 2:15 3-4, Fred won two 

 four-heat races, one five-heat race, also a red 

 ribbon at the Park Riding School Horse Show 

 all within two weeks, and then he was sold 

 soon after. Dr. Chase. 2:10 1-4, was a steady 

 going trotter and was never beaten over a 

 head by the best trotters around Boston. Oth- 

 ers, either owned or matineed by Fred, were 

 Kelpa, 2:263-4; Mystic, 2:221-4; Chestnuts, 

 2:24 1-2; Maud C, 2:13 1-4; Reuben L., 

 2 :2^ 1-4 ; Freda, 2 :29 1-2 ; and Star King. 



Fred now acknowledges having been con- 

 nected with a "Ringing Case," as when he 

 bought Fred C, 2:11 1-4. he matineed him as 

 plain Fred, named after himself, as he said, 

 until Editor Trott, who knew the horse on 

 sight, gave him away in the Boston Globe. 



The last time Fred was seen in public hold- 

 ing the ribbons was when he, by request, drove 

 Luther P.. a noted puller, who had been beaten 

 the previous week at Charles River Speedway 

 with a "Professional" up, halves in I :20, but 

 whom Fred piloted to a popular and long shot 

 victory in time as fast as 1 :i6. over a horse 

 generally capable of stepping in 1:12, and an- 

 other contestant who could always go in 1 :i4 

 to 1:15. The following week, under similar 

 conditions, hut witli another driver behind 

 Luther P., Luther was badly beaten by the 

 same horses, as he materially missed Fred's 

 reinsmanship, and Luther's opponents missed 

 Fred's musical voice. 



Fred, after four years of pleasurable sport 

 with the aforementioned horses, now says, 

 "Never again!" and has given up horses en- 

 tirelv on account of the condition on Boston 



