Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-08-11
By Clarence L. Cullen.

The handbook business. which wabbled to
its final teter-over through the crusade
against 1t inaugurated by The Star about a
month ago. received it's biggest boost, and
was started on the way to its greatest can
eerous growth when Crandal Mackey, the
nervy, determined and uncompromising
prosecuting attorney of Alexandria county,
put the St. Asaph poolroom out of business
about two and half years ago.
While the St. Asaph betting shed was
running-and running in open defiance of
all law until Mackey got into the saddle
there was little OF no handbooking around
this town. There was no need for It. St
Asaph got nearly every dollar of the horse
play. 1t was an easy ride down to the old
st. Asaph barn-ffteen or twenty minutes
on the trolley, and there were the prices all
chalked UP for three or four tracks with
the jockeys. weights. condition of track
and all the rest of the dope.
The chaps with the pony bug like to get
the results al first hand when they can, and
for this purpose poolroom is just about as
good as the track Itself, for the operator
calls off the races as they are run from
start to finish, and the excitement IN q
poolroom over the operators sing-outs Is
just as great as that at the track AS
matter OF fact. a lot of the confirmed pony
dopesters prefer going to poolrooms to
slough off their coin than visiting the
tracks, for the reason that the journey to a
race track, even when one is handy, in
wolves q lot of hustltng and bother, and,
when 1t is reached, the crowd is generally
so great that the average visitor doesn't
see much of a race till the horses are vamp
hight down to the wire close to the last six
teenth pole, and even then most track WIS.,
itors have difficulty in sorting over the COL
ors Of the jockey riding the horse they've
played.
Benning People Wise.
The people behind the Benning track fully
understand, themselves, that the blown-in-
the-bottle dopesters vastly prefer to gamble
off their horse money at the poolrooms, for,
when the ST. Asaph poolroom was running,
the Benning hackers were powerful enough
with the telegraph company to arrange
matters so that the ST. Asaph room couldn't
get the results from Bennlng while the rae
ing was in progress there If the Benning
races had been on tap at the St. Asaph
room the Benning track would have looked,
on any old racing afternoon, like some kind
Of a place that had been overlooked in the
betting, while the big shed down St
Asaph way would have resembled one of
those rarebit dreams of the seethng. swirl
ing, squirming crowd, with not enough
room to get your money out OF your pocket
AS q matter Of fact, it was the ST. Aspah
poolroom crowd, which. a number of years
ago, got behind the unsuccessful effort
which was made to put the shutters up at
the Benning plant.
It was when Crandal Mackay put the
dilapidating touch on the st. Asaph outht
that the horse-betting disease broke OUT
in nav way. or Virtually new way, so
far ia !" as this town was concerned. The few
handbook men who did their penncilins
around Washington while Ct. Asaph was
s 70 cali PIT It Ia beneitNof such horsedope
frivoiers as had not the. time to make the
ST. Asaph betting shed of afternoons. Their
pony fiends Just made the st, Asaph In
stitution whether they had the time Or not.
They tgok tRs tins: They 81 grabbed a St TIE tine
the cali Of the poolroom operator Is