1952 A meeting of track owners are informed that a mechanism for automatically opening the starting traps which most rejected as being too expensive – at £115 – has been operating at Romford and Dagenham for three years. In over 5,000 races it has failed twice.
1961 Former Walthamstow minor open racer Which Chariot changes hands for a “Mile Bush Pride type of price” after winning a number of races for trainer Frank Schock. Bred by Paddy Quealy from Lismore, Chariot eventually goes to stud and later appears as the great grand sire of top Aussie sires like Chief Dingaan and Temlee.
2000 A greyhound’s body, minus one ear, is found beside the A46 near Evesham. A group of greyhound enthusiasts pledge a bounty of £10,000 for information leading to a conviction.
1951 Catford’s newest trainer is former British lightweight boxing champion Matt Wells who won a Lonsdale Belt outright.
1962 Prairie Flash is the 9-1 ante post favourite for the 1962 English Derby. The eventual winner is one of the joint second favourites, The Grand Canal.
2003 The Hove commentator thought he had got away with a slight indiscretion when a lit cigarette butt slipped onto his chair a burnt a small hole. It was quickly extinguished. Nobody would ever know. A few weeks later, he was required to announce the runners for an impending open, the Who Burnt The Chair Sprint.
1947 With dozens of attempts being made to forge tote tickets, a tote manager at a London track was highly suspicious of a punter who knocked at his door and demanded to be paid out around £200 (index linked to around £6,500) on a T3-T4 winning forecast. The stadium employee minutely examined each ticket but was unable to find any alteration and duly paid out the punter. It was some minutes after the punter had left that the soon-to-be demoted employee discovered the result of the race was actually T4-T3.
1963 February 15 A slight thaw in the weather allows Norwich City to race for the first time since December 21. The stadium lost 15 consecutive meetings.
1951 The four major titles won by the famous ringer Red Wind are expunged from the race records by the NGRC and replaced by the runners-up. Behattan Marquis is promoted to ‘winner’ of the 1950 Anglo-Irish and Wood Lane Stakes. Ballygurren Garratt is now the winner of the 1949 Wimbledon Puppy Derby; Richmond Tanist gets the Midlands equivalent. The 28.57 White City 525 yard track record is also ditched and the previous clock of 28.65 held by Priceless Border is reinstated.
1966 Hare manufacturers Sumner announce they have landed the contract to supply the lure at the new Las Palmas track in the Canary Islands. Meanwhile a Japanese entrepreneur has exported the first 30 dogs from an intended batch of 300 for a new stadium in Tokyo.
1934 Wimbledon’s Popular Plate is contested by six littermates from a Mick The Miller and Toftwood Misery. ‘Mick The’ Cheerful, Cavalier, Commander, Curious, Cyclone and Courier are all owned by Mrs Arundel H Kempton and trainer Sidney Orton.
1953 Yorkshire police apply to local magistrates to have the liquor licence revoked from Darnell Greyhound Track after reporting 16 occasions of alcohol being sold to under-18s.
1944 February 26. A group of Wimbledon employees were engaged in a heavy duty card school and decided to ignore air raid warnings. Within minutes, the stadium was being showered with 600 incendiary bombs. No one was hurt, though the main stand, offices, kitchen and totalisator were all destroyed. Racing was shut down for two weeks and, according one slightly miffed employee, there was no sign of a rather large winnings kitty.
1937 The first greyhound to cross the Irish Sea by Air is Lone Keel. A hitch in his registration prevents him from taking part in a puppy competition at West Ham, but he stays over with private trainer S Wright, who steers him to four wins out of six races during the month.
1974 Paddy McEllistrim and Stan Martin both retire as Wimbledon trainers. Paddy (82) arrived, with greyhounds to sell before the track even opened in 1928. His biggest winner was Spotted Rory in the St Leger. Martin was a former head lead to Joe Harmon who died in 1941. Martin won two English Derbys with Ballymac Ball and Ballyhennessy Seal. Ball also won two Laurels.
1936 February 14 The Golden Jubilee Crufts Dog Show at Agricultural Hall, Islington, is attended by the founder Charles Cruft, now aged 84. It draws a record entry of 10,650 of which 51 are greyhounds.
1980 Figures released by the NGRC show that the attendances at Britain’s 47 greyhound tracks dipped below the six million mark for the first time. The average attendance is 1,044. Ten year earlier it was 1,412. The news was not all bad with some tracks producing tote increases in excess of 20%. Ipswich, Brighton and Shawfield fared particularly well.
1947 Greyhound Owner goes on sale for the first time. It is only available on subscription – 8 shillings for three months.
1982 Peter Rich’s Ramsgate raider Glen Miner set a new Wembley 490 metre record of 28.98, one spot quicker than Decoy Ranger’s previous best.
1937 February The GRA buys Battersea Stadium in Lombard Road, London SW11, for an undisclosed sum. The stadium opened in 1933 had been racing under independent rules, and the GRA are to convert it into an ice-skating rink for ice hockey and public skating.
1984 Wimbledon are making preparations for the closure of White City by widening the track by two and a half feet and reducing the banking around the first two bends. Statistics compiled by the track show that 23 per cent of winner led by the first bend, and 33 per cent did not lead until after the last bend.
1985 The London race wrecking gang, who caused a string of races to be made void during the previous year, strike at Wembley. With heavily backed Gizzajob apparently struggling behind Decoy Lassie, a tarpaulin is thrown onto the track which distracts the winner causes a no-race. The perpetrators escape.
2012 Belle Vue play host to BAGS chairman Tom Kelly and see seven of the first eight races won by trap six – followed home by trap five on six occasions.
1971 Supersire Newdown Heather – pictured with the legendary trainer/stud keeper Jask Mullan -completed a double/double when Hack Up Chieftain and Tearaway Bess win the Coursing Derby and Oaks respectively. The previous year the same sire had been successful with Tender Heather and Tender Honey.
