Du Pont Track

Last spring when his horses. Fairy Hill and Rosemont. won the $50,000 Santa Anita Derby and the $100,000 Santa Anita Handicap in quick succession, William du Pont Jr., whose reputation as the horsiest member of his Delaware clan had previously been based on his stable of steeplechasers, decided to open a race track of his own. Last week the new track, Delaware's first since the State Legislature legalized betting in 1935,* opened. In the feature race of opening day, some 20,000 spectators saw Mrs. C. Oliver Iselin's Strabo nose out John Hay Whitney's Flying Scott.

Built for $750,000, run on a non-profit basis with proceeds split between the State and the Delaware Steeplechase & Racing Association, Delaware Park (near Wilmington) aims to fill the gap in fashionable Eastern racing between the closing of Belmont Park in June, the opening of Saratoga in August. Noteworthy feature of the plant is a lawn that slopes sharply down from the grandstand to the track to permit spectators to see races without going back to their seats.

* Reversing the trend toward legal betting that started in 1932, Texas last month repealed its 1933 law legalizing booking bets on horse-races and parimutuel bets on dog-races. Fortnight ago the now superfluous Texas Racing Commission received from one Tom Katz of Mesquite a postcard application for a license to operate a cat-racing track. Ingenious Tom Katz, besides describing the electric mice with which he proposed to excite spry young felines, explained that he would also give employment to middle-aged and retired cats by having them chased into holes at the end of a 75-yd track by electric dogs. The Texas Racing Commission suspected Applicant Katz was not serious.

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