Sunny Jim

by Breslin, Jimmy;

  Mr. Fitz wasn’t that lofty. He was more interested in the horse’s nostrils.

  “They’re a little small for my tastes,” he was saying. “They have trouble breathin’ during a race if the nostrils ain’t big enough. I wish his were a little wider. Horse don’t seem to have much to breathe with up there. We’ll just have to take ’em and see what he can do.”

  Woodward said something about naming the horse Gallant Fox. Then they went on to look at the next.

  The next year, Gallant Fox was in the Fitzsimmons barn at Aqueduct, about as lazy an animal as anybody ever came across. He would run with another horse in the morning, then stop dead the minute he passed him. Mr. Fitz put a second horse halfway around and when Gallant Fox got there he found he had another horse to beat and that finally kept him going. But if you didn’t play tricks with him he’d do everything but lean against the rail and fall asleep. In his first couple of starts, Gallant Fox was well out of it. But Mr. Fitz saw one thing in him: the horse was coming on at the end every time.

  Since early two-year-old races are for short distances, it looked like he simply needed more ground to cover. He got it at Saratoga, winning two races, the Flash and Junior Champion Stakes, and he looked like a lock for the rich Futurity that fall at Belmont Park. He seemed to be able to suck in enough air through those nostrils to give a car a run for it.

  Mr. Fitz thought so, too. When the horses went to the gate for the Futurity, he walked into the infield and stood near the wire of the Widener Chute, a straight course which bisected the running oval and was used for major two-year-old races. He had spent a lot of time trying to get a little more pep into Gallant Fox during the early part of a race, so now, as he watched the flashes of silk in the starting gate, he was looking for the red polka dots of Belair. He wanted to see his work pay dividends. The Fox would come out running a little better this time, he thought. This wouldn’t hurt anybody, either. The Futurity is big at the bank. Then the bell rang, the flaps banged open and here came Whichone going to the lead, with a horse called Hi-jack right on him. Somewhere back in the dust-clouded, bobbing mass of horses was Gallant Fox. He had thrown a no-’count start at Mr. Fitz, and now Gallant Fox had to come on like hell at the end to get third money. Whichone took first, which carried the slight matter of $76,520 to it. If Mr. Fitz’s charge had won the race, he would have been counting out almost eight grand for the bank teller on Monday. Instead, he had nothing to do but go back to work and try to get Gallant Fox to run a little better a lot earlier. He turned around and started walking toward the gap in the infield rail. Nobody said much to Mr. Fitz. It’s better not to talk to a man who loses a tough one like this. John Fitzsimmons walked up to meet his father at the gap. Even he was ready to be extra quiet. Mr. Fitz came up to him, didn’t even break stride, and John fell in beside him.

  “Say, Johnny,” Mr. Fitz said, “what’s playin’ at the movie down in Sheepshead Bay tonight?”

  He never mentioned the race again.

  By the next spring, there was no rap you could put on Gallant Fox. He filled out over the winter and now his muscles bulged inside his sleek coat and he looked like he could run through a brick wall. He was now the first of the great horses for Mr. Fitz, the one who could get it all. He looked every inch of that. So much so that one afternoon, for the first time, Woodward came out to the barn to talk to him about the handling of a horse. From the day they shook hands on the farm in Maryland, Woodward and Mr. Fitz had the kind of relationship anybody trying to do a good job should have. Woodward had hired a trainer, and under no circumstances would he interfere with his man. “How are you?” is the only question Woodward ever asked. This time, however, he wanted to have a say. The horse was the first Woodward ever fell in love with, and people are a little different when this happens.

  “Fitz,” he said, “wouldn’t it be good if we got a regular rider for this horse?”

  “Yes, it would,” Mr. Fitz agreed. “Who would you like to get?”

  “Who would you like?”

  “The fella that can do the best job.”

  The fella who could do the best job, they agreed, was Earl Sande. The year before, Sande had gone down in a terrible fall. When he got out of the hospital he had decided to retire from riding. He had won Kentucky Derbies on Zev and Flying Ebony. He had ridden Man o’ War and Grey Lag and Mad Play and Chance Shot. He had money, wanted to be a trainer and own the horses himself. He felt he was through taking risks. The fall made him decide to get out. But after laying around for a full year—he was up on only ten horses in 1929, with only one winner—Sande found that money, if you kept sending it out and not replacing it, could become something of a problem. He decided to come back to riding horses. Everybody waited to see what kind of shape he was in, but Mr. Fitz and Woodward didn’t bother. Mr. Fitz knew enough about Sande. Earl had gristle inside his stomach and a heart that pumped the bright and rich red blood that runs in only the few. Sande had the confidence that goes with it, too. When Woodward offered him a flat fee of $10,000 to ride Gallant Fox for the year, Earl turned it down. He had seen enough of Gallant Fox to know what he had. He wanted 10 per cent of all the purses he won.

  “We’re going to win a lot of races,” he said. He got his percentage deal.

  Mr. Fitz began to put Gallant Fox in shape for the big three-year-old races. First there were the long gallops, overly long, it seemed to most horse people on the grounds. Then he began to set him down in a series of speed works that seemed to be brutal. It is Mr. Fitz’s way to train a horse. This big, royally bred animal could take all you threw at him, he figured. He never has babied a horse.

  “You got to get them to do what they’re raised for,” he insists. “Spoil ’em and you’re ruining their chances.”

  On Saturday, April 26, 1930, Gallant Fox was standing in the saddling enclosure at Jamaica race track with Fish Tappen and a groom around him while Mr. Fitz and Sande stood and talked quietly about what to do in the Wood Memorial, which was to be run in a couple of minutes. Woodward was off to one side. He had put his hand into the business with Gallant Fox just once. He would never say another thing for the rest of his life. Then Sande got up on Gallant Fox, went out on the track and won by five lengths, running away from a horse called Crack Brigade and another called Desert Light. It was no contest at all and after it, in the clubhouse, Tom Shaw, the bookmaker, turned around and began quoting a new price on Gallant Fox in the Kentucky Derby. Gallant Fox had been 8-1. He now was 4-1.

  The Preakness at Pimlico was to come first. It was run a week before the Derby at this time. So on May 9, coming around the tight last turn at Pimlico, Crack Brigade was showing the way. But Gallant Fox moved to him as the track became straight. They started down the stretch as one. At the sixteenth pole, Gallant Fox got his head in front, then began to draw away. The official margin was three parts of a length and after the race Mr. Fitz was arranging for transportation to Louisville and the Derby for Gallant Fox. Then he went back to Aqueduct where, on Monday morning, he’d be up taking care of the rest of the horses.

  Fish Tappen went to Churchill Downs with Gallant Fox. He had the horse out on the track for a light workout Monday. Mr. Fitz was at Aqueduct. Tappen took care of the horse on Tuesday, too. Mr. Fitz stayed in New York with the rest of the horses. On Wednesday, Tappen gave the Fox his big prep for the race. He brought the horse through the gap from the barn area and onto the track early, while a mob followed after him, looking and taking notes and asking questions. At Churchill Downs, the Derby favorite always gets an entourage which looks in awe at the horse, and follows him constantly. The horse returns this affection by trying to sink his teeth into the shoulder of the nearest idiot. Tappen, never given to speeches, stationed himself against the rail while Sande, singing softly to Gallant Fox in the morning air, started off down the track. He galloped easily over to the head of the stretch, then took off. The work was for the full Derby distance of a mile and a quarter. This race always is the first time in a horse’s life t
hat he goes this far. The big question before it always centers on whether the horse can last the distance. Mr. Fitz’s answer to this always has been sure he can go a mile and a quarter. Question is, can he run it fast enough. On this particular morning there seemed to be legitimate concern over Gallant Fox’s ability even to finish the workout. The horse wasn’t interested in any workout on any race track on this day. Sande wasn’t pressing him, either. So the horse took his time about things and negotiated the distance in 2:19.

  Up in the grandstand, Tommy Oliphant, the clocker, punched his watch as Gallant Fox finished the work. He looked at it, then shook his head.

  “He run it in trottin’ horse time.”

  Mr. Fitz still was at Aqueduct supervising his stable. Fish called him in mid-morning, told him about the work, and both agreed it was fine.

  “I’ll be down tomorrow,” Mr. Fitz said.

  Around Louisville, they were trying to figure out what was going on. Here was the Derby favorite working like a milk horse and his trainer hadn’t even bothered to come down and supervise the horse personally for a race that was, by now, the biggest in the country. It was something they were to wonder about whenever Mr. Fitz came up with a big horse. He has always conducted his business on the theory that a weak horse, just like a weak child, needs all the work. The big one is better off if left alone when he gets in form. Gallant Fox was in form. He was coming off a good race. But up at Aqueduct Mr. Fitz had fifty-one other horses, some of them nervous animals that needed a lot of work before they’d come around and run properly. He left Gallant Fox alone.

  “Gallant Fox?” Mr. Fitz was saying, “what am I going to do with him, except run him Saturday? I’d be wastin’ my time down there.”

  So on Thursday, jacket slung over his arm, suspenders bunching up his shirt, an outrageous tie setting it all off, James E. Fitzsimmons came into Louisville by train for the most glamorous race in the country. He had Gallant Fox on the track Friday morning for a three-furlong tightener, then sent the horse back to the barn and he and Fish went to the movies.

  On Saturday, the cramped saddling enclosures at Churchill Downs was crowded with owners, trainers, and officials, and by the time Earl Sande and the rest of the riders came down the wooden stairs from the jockeys’ room, the tension had reached its peak. Then the jocks got up, the outriders started to lead the field out to the track and one of racing’s great moments was about to take place. Mr. Fitz and Tappen trailed along. They were through playing “My Old Kentucky Home” by the time Mr. Fitz came out of the tunnel, and there wasn’t a place you could find to sit or stand and still see the race. Fish and Mr. Fitz walked across the track to the winner’s circle, which was empty. It seemed like a good spot. But as the horses started to jog toward the starting gate, a couple of uniformed track police hustled toward them.

  “We got to clear this place out,” they told Mr. Fitz. “You all have to go over there. You watch the race from there. We can’t have you standin’ here.”

  Mr. Fitz did not say who he was. He didn’t think that would matter. So he let the cops steer him into the packed infield. The people all were crammed against a wire fence, in good position to shove and push and crane their necks and see, at best, almost nothing of the race. Mr. Fitz was wedged between onlookers when the track announcer said it was post time. He was still jammed there when the crowd gave a big roar. Here they come, somebody yelled. Here was the biggest moment in Mr. Fitz’s life and he was looking squarely at the neck of some guy from Evansville who needed a haircut.

  The crowd was roaring for some time before he got a glimpse of the race. Alcibiades on the lead, with Buckey Poet pressing and Tannery trying to run with them. Running fifth, free of trouble, was Gallant Fox. The field headed down the track toward the first turn and that was the last Mr. Fitz saw of them for a long time. When he picked up the horses again, they were way over on the other side of the track. But this time he didn’t mind the mess at all. Because Sande had Gallant Fox going now. He had moved on the first flight of horses going around the turn and now down the backstretch he brought Gallant Fox up to Alcibiades, then ran along with him for awhile. Gallant Fox loved it. He began to reach out and dig in. He taunted the other horse. Come on and run, he was saying. Alcibiades tried to stay with him, but Gallant Fox knocked him out and pulled away by two lengths. Then Mr. Fitz couldn’t see the horses again. The crowd was in the way. But the track announcer kept saying it was Gallant Fox on the lead. And Sande was holding him there. Earl had ridden perfectly so far. He had kept his horse out of trouble every foot of the way. He hadn’t done a thing to use up any more of Gallant Fox than necessary. Now he came around the last turn with a ton of live horse under him and the big crowd began to roar as the great rider of his time hunched low on Gallant Fox’s back, his body moving as if he were part of the horse, and the two of them came down the stretch with the rhythm of the big winner. With a sixteenth of a mile left to go, Mr. Fitz finally saw his horse again and it was something. Gallant Fox looked like a Currier & Ives print. He was moving along majestically, two lengths to the good; it could have been five or six any time he wanted. His blazed face and redhooded head was nodding playfully. Mr. Fitz could see it all. The guy who needed a haircut had moved his head to one side for awhile.

  High up in the press box atop the Churchill Downs roof, a thin man, glasses perched on his nose, teeth clamped on a pencil, began to hit the shift key on his typewriter in a nervous moment. Then he began to type. When he finished the first page he gave it to a telegrapher who started to tap it out in Morse code. It read:

  dpr collect, sports, new york american derby lead…

  By Damon Runyon

  LOUISVILLE, May 19—Say, have they turned back the ages, Back to a Derby out of the yore? Say, don’t tell me I’m daffy, Ain’t that the same old grin? Why it’s that Handy Guy Named Sande Bootin’ them Babies in.

  It was one of the greatest newspaper stories ever written about sports. It was all for Sande, who was in the winner’s circle now on his third Kentucky Derby winner. They were putting a big blanket of roses over Gallant Fox’s neck and the crowd back in the stands was cheering for the jockey. Sande had made a big comeback. He ranked alongside Babe Ruth, Bobby Jones, Red Grange, Bill Tilden, Walter Hagen, and Jack Dempsey in what they always call the Golden Age of Sports. It was a tremendous day for him.

  Mr. Fitz didn’t know a thing about all of this. He and Fish were trying to get out of the infield and get over to the barn so they could get a look at Gallant Fox. A half hour later, while Colonel Matt J. Winn, the Churchill Downs president, was pouring champagne for Woodward, Sande, and other dignitaries, Mr. Fitz was over on the other side of the track, leaning against the shedrow while a groom hot-walked Gallant Fox.

  “He’s fine, boss,” the groom was saying. “He’s a great one, ain’t he?”

  “Never mind the talk,” Mr. Fitz said. “Give him a little bit of water, then keep him walkin’. This ain’t a popularity contest.”

  “What are we goin’ to do for celebratin? We going to have a party?”

  “We’ll have a party. Monday morning at Aqueduct we’ll have a party. It’ll start at five in the morning.”

  Mr. Fitz was hitting it sky-high now, but as far as Jennie Fitzsimmons was concerned, none of it really mattered. She never had cared when the man used to come home at night with a dollar and maybe some loose change in his pocket. Now that he was coming home with checks for $10,000 in his wallet, she was most certainly not about to change. The money meant nothing. Anything that it brought meant less. She took whatever she was handed and promptly gave it away. There is no way to tell what Jennie gave away during her lifetime, but since this was her main pleasure in life it is taken for granted that she gave away an awful lot. Here and there, over the years, her family has, in fact, seen signs of it.

  One Sunday morning some few years ago, Jack Fitzsimmons, a grandson, was at Mass in the Immaculate Heart of Mary Roman Catholic Church in San Antonio, Texas, which was near
the Army post where he was stationed. On the way out, he happened to look at the thick pillars, all of which carried a brass plaque with the name of the person who donated the money to build the pillar. One of them read, DONATED BY JENNIE HARVEY FITZSIMMONS OF SHEEPSHEAD BAY, NEW YORK.

  Her whole life was this way. It consisted of a series of days in which she tried to do something for somebody. Anybody. It didn’t matter who. Even if it happened to be a dog. Mrs. Fitzsimmons at one time had a dog named Jerry, who had some collie in him and an appetite usually found in bears. He turned up missing one day and remained that way through several newspaper ads. Finally, he was found in another part of Brooklyn, a good half-hour away. With nobody around at the moment to drive over and collect the dog, Mrs. Fitzsimmons called for a taxi. She gave the driver the address and asked him to pick up the party and bring him back.

  When the hackie found what the party was he exploded. When the party tried to lick the back of his neck on the drive home, the hackie was certain the dog was trying to take his head off. The trip became a series of near accidents.

  At red lights, the hackie also took abuse from anybody who happened to see Jerry sitting proudly on the back seat, the way he always did in a car, and the meter clocking away. The meter ran almost eight dollars for the trip, a good job if you drive cabs, but when the hackie finished his run and deposited the dog, he made a solemn oath that the next call coming from the Fitzsimmons house would have to be for a human being.

  The dog was an important thing in her life, as any of the Fitzsimmons offspring who rode in cars were to find out. Each August, Nana, as they called Jennie Fitzsimmons, would get into a car containing John, his wife Mae, seven or eight children and Jerry and start off for the month at Saratoga. The dog would start the trip on the floor, which was not his style at all. He was not backward about letting it be known, either. After a half hour of Jerry’s shifting around and dog-moaning, Nana would tap one of the children and say, “Now you be good and stand up for a while and let Jerry sit. The one tapped would get up and Jerry would take a seat and ride the rest of the way to Saratoga in style.”