RECOLLECTIONS OF MEN AND HORSES 



on the turf with a record of 2.2oJ. I bred her to 

 Alcantara and she produced the roan colt Moth 

 Miller, that has taken a two-year-old mark this sea- 

 son of 2.2i|. I began to increase my brood mares, 

 and then found that it was necessary to buy a stal- 

 lion. I went on a quiet hunt, and finally decided 

 on Ralph Wilkes. I was determined to get a first- 

 class horse or none at all." 



Ralph Wilkes was a chestnut horse, foaled 

 in 1889 by Red Wilkes (son of George Wilkes), 

 dam Mary Mays by Mambrino Patchen; sec- 

 ond dam by imp. Sarpedon, and in 1891, as 

 a two-year-old, he trotted to a record of 2.18. 

 In 1894 Colonel John E. Thayer and his twin 

 brother, Bayard, went to the October meeting 

 at Lexington buoyed up with hope. Ralph Wilkes, 

 who was in the training stable of James Golden, had 

 shown so much speed that his owners were sure of 

 decided victories in the land of Blue Grass. The 

 two brothers sat well back in the grand stand, where 

 the October sunshine streamed upon them and re- 

 vealed the changing expressions of their faces, and 

 I shall never forget the deepening shadow of disap- 

 pointment when the nervous chestnut stallion became 

 rattled, through prolonged scoring, and was dis- 

 gracefully beaten. The Messrs. Thayer took an 

 early train for Boston, while Golden went to Nash- 

 ville with the stallion. The official timers at 

 Nashville, when Ralph Wilkes started against the 

 watch for a fast record, were Wm. Russell Allen 



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