CHAPTER III 



" MONKEY ON THE STICK " IN PRACTICE 



Friendship with "Pittsburg Phil"— Cork Cutter to MilUonaire— 

 QuaUties which helped him to make Three Million Dollars- 

 American Tick-tacking— Determination to go East 



After the successes spoken of at the end of 1894 I 

 fell sick in 1895, and Mr and Mrs Rose brought me back 

 to Indiana to recover. I had a long bad time of it, 

 but I got well enough to start riding again at the State 

 Fair at Sacramento and beat everything which was 

 fancied. Everything I touched, too, turned to gold ; 

 talk about "Get-Rich-Quick Walhngford"; he was 

 nothing to me, and I had chances of making money in 

 speculation right outside racing. 



In the autumn of 1895 I went to San Francisco, and 

 it was there that I first met "Pittsburg Phil." A 

 straighter man never existed on the Turf. I have 

 mentioned that he began life as a cork cutter; his 

 real name was George E. Smith, and in his early days, 

 when putting in all he knew at his work, he could never 

 earn more than one dollar twenty-five cents — that 

 is, five shillings a day. " P. P." occupied a place 

 among racing notabilities that has never been filled, 

 and probably never will, and he made a vast fortune 

 despite the fact that he was never liked by the Jockey 

 Club members and was made to feel that he was not 

 desirable to them. He stuck it as long as he could, 

 despite all the terrible difficulties put in his way. The 

 Club's argument was that he was a bad example and 

 did harm to the standing of racing. Years after I 



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