|
|
The Long Riders Guild Academic Foundation |
|
|
Equestrian Wisdom & History Books Astonishing Rides, Rescues & Races
Website designed by Basha O'Reilly
|
There were all sorts of crazy horse races run in the West, one of the craziest being one that was proposed and won by Calamity Jane herself. She was sitting in front of a saloon beside her horse, Jim, when a stranger rode up and invited her to trade horses. He was willing, he said, to prove that his horse could out run hers under any conditions, for money, marbles, or whiskey. She said the idea of a race sort of appealed to her and inquired if she might name the distance and conditions. The stranger said he was willing, and each of them put one hundred dollars in the hands of a stake holder, winner to take all. Calamity Jane then had a notary write down the terms of the race, and it was signed and witnessed by two passing gamblers. The terms she dictated were as follows: "We'll start twenty feet back of the platform where the horses are now standing, jump the horses up on the platform, ride into the saloon, take a drink, ride out through the back door, enter the next saloon by the back door, have a drink there, and out the front, enter the next saloon, and so on all the way down the street until all eleven saloons and dance halls on that side of the street are visited in turn. First horse at the bar of the last saloon gets the money." Her horse had been trained to do this stunt and had done it for years, and when he got to a bar, he could even take a bottle in his teeth, up-end it, and drink just like a man - and with about the similar consequences. Calamity Jane won the race by three saloons and four drinks. |
|
© COPYRIGHT 2001 - 2014
|
