Santa Anita

Never sufficiently publicized to suit themselves, cinema celebrities will stop at nothing to get their pictures into the papers. They will, even as two cinemactresses did within the fortnight, molest dumb animals of great value, at the risk of being arrested.

At Arcadia, Calif., the newest and most elaborate racetrack in the U. S., Santa Anita Park, will open for a 53-day meet on Christmas Day. In the feature race of the meet, the Santa Anita Handicap, a dozen of the most famed horses in the world, including Equipoise, Twenty Grand, Mate, Cavalcade, Statesman and Head Play, will run for the biggest purse ($100,000 added) offered this year. Lest these facts escape the attention of the U. S. sporting public, Cinemactress Marian Marsh last fortnight visited Santa Anita to have herself photographed with Head Play. Annoyed by her posturings, Head Play bit her on the shoulder. Last week, apparently less dismayed by Miss Marsh's experience than encouraged by the commotion it caused, Cinemactress Inez Courtney visited the track to hang an enormous wreath on Twenty Grand. Twenty Grand failed to oblige the photographers and pressagents by taking so much as a nip at Miss Courtney.

When, after 25 years, betting at race tracks was legalized in California last year, sportsmen all over the State were in a dither to start a track. Cineman Hal Roach (Our Gang Comedies), who plays better polo than most of his confreres, wanted one near Los Angeles. Dr. Charles H. Strub, onetime dentist who made his fortune with a chain of painless extraction parlors and later owned the San Francisco baseball club, wanted one at San Francisco. But onetime Newsboy William P. Kyne got ahead of him with Bay Meadows at San Mateo, which last week ended its successful first meet. Producer Roach and Dr. Strub got together, raised $1,250,000, bought 210 acres of the famed Santa Anita Rancho at Arcadia where 40 years ago the late Elias Jackson ("Lucky") Baldwin bred racehorses and where four of his American Derby winners* are buried under a concrete Maltese Cross, replica of his racing emblem. Since last March, workmen have been busy making Santa Anita one of the best equipped racing plants in the U. S. If all works out as its sponsors hope, the new venture should some day rank with Saratoga and Belmont.

To avoid disputes, the last few yards of every race at Santa Anita will be photographed by a camera with a shutter which operates at 120 frames a second. The pictures, developed within three minutes, will determine the official result. Electric devices will time every race to within 1,100 of a second. For bettors, Santa Anita will have a $250,000 "totalizator" to estimate pari-mutuel odds. Santa Anita's stables will accommodate 1,200 horses. Its aquamarine grandstand, facing the snow-capped Sierra Madre mountains, will seat 60,000. Box seats for the opening were sold out before the boxes were built. Club memberships, which cost $250 each, are limited to 500, of which all were sold as soon as the project started. In the clubhouse, members can drink at a modernistic bar, step outside to watch the races from their balcony boxes. Before each race, all the horses entered will visit a special circular "receiving barn," from which owners and handlers are excluded and in which officials will make sure the animals are not doped. The public will watch them saddled in a paddock landscaped with potted orange trees. The trees will have nets over them to keep visitors from eating the oranges.

The Santa Anita Handicap to be run Feb. 23 will not only be the season's richest race but, if all the horses named run in it, one of the most interesting. Horses from England (Statesman), Australia (Pillow Flight) and Canada (Trombone) are entered. For U. S. horsemen it will settle a three-year-old argument as to the merits of Mate (shipped back from England last fortnight), Twenty Grand (brought out of retirement for the race) and Equipoise. For Equipoise or Mate victory in the Santa Anita Handicap means beating Sun Beau's record winnings of $376,744. Last week, at Lexington, Ky., accompanied by his Schnauzer, eleven other horses and ten attendants, Equipoise boarded his special car for Los Angeles.

*Volante, 1885; Silver Cloud, 1886; Emperor of Norfolk, 1888; Key el Santa Anita, 1894.

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