Lots of people get things named after them. George Washington got about 200,000 streets named after him, a monument, a state, a city, a couple of universities, a bridge here and there, and a high school in every nook and hamlet in the hemisphere. Lincoln got a car named after him, also a tunnel. Grant got a tomb.
Napoleon got a brandy, Caesar got a salad. They named a tank after Sherman, furniture after Louis XIV, a candy bar after Babe Ruth and Reggie Jackson and toast after Madame Melba. McKinley got a mountain.
Big deal! Know what I've got named after me? A horse race! Not a race horse. Lots of guys have that. Me, I got a whole race of my very own. Match that around Washington, D.C., or Paris, France.
Sunday Silence won't be in it. It's not (yet) a part of the Triple Crown. I don't know that Easy Goer will be shipping out for it. So far as I know, Wayne Lukas hasn't been holding out a horse for it.
But these things start slowly. It's at the classic distance, a mile and a quarter, and I have no doubt that, in a year or two, it will be right up there with the Kentucky Derby. Maybe it'll be another jewel added to the Triple Crown. Or, maybe, it'll replace the Belmont. I'm a little worried it might upstage the Breeders' Cup. I'll bet Bill Shoemaker is sorry he retired too early to add the Murray to his illustrious list of stakes wins.
Ever notice these things always happen to you too late? I'm just sorry my Uncle Ed isn't here to see this. You remember my Uncle Ed? My gambling uncle?
Ed was what your Aunt Matilda would call a pool shark. He could do things with a pool cue that Zorro couldn't do with a sword. He could stack a deck of cards blindfolded and let you cut them twice. He was the best crapshooter in New England till a guy named Pittsfield Dick wiped him out one night in an Elks Club in Athol, Mass. Pittsfield Dick had an unfair advantage. He was sober.
Ed was the one who got me started in racing. He took me to my first horse race. At Agawam in Massachusetts. Neither Agawam nor Uncle Ed is here anymore. Ed died broke. So did Agawam in that Depression year.
I won on a horse called Kievex and Ed said afterward that might be the worst thing that ever happened to me.
Ed tried to beat the horses two ways--as a bookmaker and as a player. He didn't have much luck either way. Ed's problem was that he was always looking for an edge. He boiled dice, stacked decks and always wore glasses (which he didn't need) and, sometimes, a clerical collar if he played out of town.
