Chicago Horse Show

President Coolidge pressed a button in the White House. No secretary or stenographer entered; no uniformed blackamoor thrust his head around a screen, but far away in Chicago a gong rang; the lights in the huge amphitheatre of the Chicago Riding Club flashed on; a fine brass band assisted by a $50,000 organ struck up successively the national anthems of Belgium, France, England, the U. S., while a mighty shout arose from the crowd. National Horse Show had begun.

President Coolidge, in the White House, sat down to pass a pleasant evening with a dossier of papers and a pair of carpet slippers, but in the Chicago Riding Club thoroughbred horses paraded to the music of the band; society sat throned in boxes draped with Spanish shawls, which gave the place the appearance of a bull ring; delegations of children from the Catholic, Jewish and Protestant orphanages and from the Illinois Children's Home clapped their hands in delight. Once the great gathering sucked in its breath and stood up in its seats with the shivering "Ah!" that fevers a plaza de toros when the matador is tossed. This was when Vadabelle, ridden by Dick Messcrop of Port Chester, N. Y., in taking the five-foot wall at the edge of the tanbark instead of the last jump on the course, went sprawling into a group of spectators, knocking them down like dolls. But no one was hurt; Vadabelle went back to her stall. Otto W. Lehmann's Princess Mary went jingling around with a fine gait to take the heavy harness event. Miss America of the Cavalry School bested Light o' Love in the hurdles. Officers from all the countries whose national anthems the band had played rode against the U. S. on their sleek chargers and were soundly beaten. Eleven out of 13 of the early blue ribbons went to horses that were not owned, trained, bred or ridden by people from Chicago.