148 Making the American Thoroughbred 



Memphis he considered the ideal "great central place of meeting 

 of all horses from Alabama, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Illi- 

 nois and all the lower country. Those who cannot travel here at 

 all seasons of the year by steam, have as good roads as need be, and 

 not more than two hundred and forty miles to travel by land, which 

 they can do at the rate of twenty miles per day, and lodge their 

 horses comfortably every night. ... In traveling to the lower 

 country this place lies in the route of all sportsmen passing with 

 their horses. By next season they will find as good a track as ever 

 was run over, with T. G. Johnson, proprietor . . . and here you 

 will find as jolly a set of good fellows as ever you may meet with on 

 any race track." 



And so they are in 1916. 



BEAN'S STATION AND RED BRIDGE 



Reports of race meetings held at Bean's Station in 1836, 1837, 

 and 1839; and at Red Bridge, near Knoxville, in 1841, show entries 

 run by John McGhee, James Clark, John Blevins, Daniel Carmichael, 

 Cox & Morrison, Col. Samuel Bunch, William S. Geers, Daniel 

 Green, Capt. John B. Proffit, James Scruggs, George Routledge, 

 Mr. Guthrie, James M. Hord, James Powell, Capt. J. H. Anderson, 

 Clark & Bowen. In the list of entries is noticed, among others, the 

 get of Cock of the Rock, Wild Bill, Leviathan, and Bertrand. At 

 one meeting at Bean's Station, out of eleven horses that ran six were 

 Leviathans and four of the six won. No purse exceeded $500. A 

 match race for $1,500 a side was billed for Nov. 15, 1837 between 

 CarmichaeFs LADY HOLSTON, by Bertrand, and Colonel Powell's 

 ANN BARROW, by Thomas Barry's Cock of the Rock. James 

 Scruggs was Secretary of the Bean's Station Club. 



