The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1893-02-16
1RoI1lNe HORSE PRICES.
The Present Depression and tho Cause
Thereof--Fhe Hope Of the Future.
t,en sherwood I'm RandaIl's Horse Register.

The Present Depression and tho Cause
Thsreof--The Hopo Of the Future.
cen. sherwood in Randan's Horse Register
And now what shall say of the gen.
eral outlook for the trotting and pacing
horse bus ness.
The question is asked almost every
day: Why are trotters selling so much
lower this year than two years ago, and
why are 80 many breeders putting their
products under the auctioneer's merci-
less hammerp
Let US see: In Mansfield my good
friend O. II. McCue, one of the smarteht
trotting horse men in Ohio, has just
sold Sea Girl, 2:l81s, by Wilton, at Lex
ington, under the hammer, for 5000.
A year ago, as remember, at the same
city, under tho same hammer, Mr.. Nc
Cue paid $500 for her, Stamboul,
20715, holding the worlds record, ha'
| Just been sold in New York for S41 600,
while the champion Axtell, now by
good grace on the Indiana border, sold
| for 8 iO7 900. with record AZ seconds
slow, T than S.amb 5ul's, ,;only few brief
years ago. And quite recently TWO
fairly well bred sons of George Wilkes,
both uuder twelve years, sold, one for
S3,SOO, and one for 81 100. These Illus.
trations will do for the basis of a few
observations:
First-Haye we struck the bottom,
and will the market improve from now
henceforth2
Second-what has caused the drop
in che price of fancy trotting stOCkp
These be pertinent, and TO the breed
er highly important questions.
/ observe that prices have dropped
| because the development of extreme
speed has been abnormilly rapid, and
the buyers of this speed have not iu-
creased in like ratio.
For instance: a few years ago nearly
| all The mllionaires OF New Y Ork, Bos-
ton and Philadelphia were road drivers.
Vanderbilt was at the head Of the
"seslskin brigade" in New York, and
the imiUators of Vanderbilt were in
every village and hamlet in the coun-
try, all buying trotters for road
horses, in proportion to the size of their
respective wallets. The metropolitan
journals were then full of the road ex.
ploits of the millionaire road drivers
on wheels and cutters, and these mil
liOnaires, who were paying fancy
prices for trotters, stimulated the
market all over the country, and the
supply of trotters was not equal to the
demand.
How is it now? You can read any
New York or Boston journal for q
week in spring, autumn or winter, and
you see no record of spirited contests
on the road. These milliOnaires are not
driving as formerly, hence they are not
buying horses at high prices. They are
spending their summers in European
watering places, educating their
daughters in European Universities,
and looking up eligible matches for
them among the dissolute Princes,
Earls, Dukes, Esquires or Sirs,
who are always anxious to scent
the flavor of American ducats, and
take an American girl in the bargain.
When at home, these millionaires
are sailing the unsalted seas and
lakes in private yachts, or luxuriating
at watering places, with broad-rumped
English Coo horses in massive harness
aud 4-inch tails, banged to ape the
much cussed 'Hinglish, ye knew. All
this hurts the trotting horse business.
Again, the bicycle craze hurts the
horse business, and has made every
living man tired from Penobscot Bay
to Puget Sound, and from Sandusky on
Lake Erie to the old shell roads out of
New Orleans and Mobile. Formerly
the young man, when he duded his dear,
took her out in narrow seated buggy
behind trotter Now he takes her
out astraddle of bicycle.
But this will all change soon. The
bicycle is the most cruel and selfish OF
all American Inventions, and soon we
shall have an appalling list Of new dis
eases for our medical colleges to dag
nose, caused by too much bicycle riding,
Weak chested, bow legged gills, with
straddle gsits, will come to curse the
fate that put them on the iron wheel
with the inadequate seat; and bent
backed. kidney affected and hollow
chested young men will stalk the earth
and fill our doctors offices with the
story Of their aches and weaknesses.
Then they will sigh for, a trotter,
for the healthy, breeze inspiring tr0t-
ter.
Hence, in the near future, very near,
the trotter will again come 70 the front.
and fashion, which leads the world, will
lead the way.
And now IS To the breeding problem.
In future article / hope to talk to
your readers on that problem.
l believe in progressive breeding
The 200 trotter is coming. She (or he)
may already be born. But the 100000
stations are probably among the things
thatwere. We have no exclusive strain
of merit now, and the records Of 1892
shows that we can even get along with
out the Wilkes blood. Nancy Hanks
is quite an educator on this side Of the
Rocky Mountains, and STEAMBOAT on
the other side, aud Kremlin speaks
louder than words for the Wilkes Bour-
bonism of Kentucky.
OF course the Wilkes family is the
| greatest family yet produced, but the
Wilkes, as | intended to remark, does
| not hold us exclusively in Its admira-
\ tion society. The records OF last year
prove that some sons of George Wilkes
| are better producers than the parent
| and the future will prove that sons OF
SONS, when mated with proper afliuities
will produce stIll greater results. AS
| Electioneer was an incomparably
| greater horse than his sire, so we opine
| that some son of Electioneer may yet
eclipse his sire. Who knows what a
son or daughter might do that came
from the lOins of Kremlin and from
the womb of Nancy Hanks?
The successful breeder of the future
will not be looking for stallion in one
| of Wallace's books, with some numeri-
Gals after his name, called his Number u
but for the blood that gets hotter and
| more vehement down the homestretch
| N thn xUfrn