Yankee Doodle Dandy: The Life and Times of Tod Sloan - Hardcover

Dizikes, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300083343 ISBN 13: 9780300083347

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2000

Synopsis

In the 1890s, feisty Tod Sloan (1874–1933) abandoned the centuries-old jockey tradition of riding in a straight sitting position and instead crouched low on the neck of his horse. The result was not only a string of victories for young Sloan but also a revolution in horse racing. In this entertaining book, award-winning author John Dizikes recounts the remarkable story of the Indiana boy who rose from obscurity to become the most famous jockey in the United States and Great Britain at the turn of the century. Dizikes evokes the turbulent, colorful world of horse racing and gambling in which Tod Sloan rocketed to celebrity―and from which he was just as dramatically ejected.

Sloan’s innovative riding style helped to transform horse racing into the first nationally popular spectator sport, drawing in huge crowds and vast amounts of betting money. But Sloan’s career was crushingly ended by those who resented and envied him. A dandy, a big spender, a man whose company women loved, Sloan related to horses in an almost magical way, yet foundered in his dealings with people. This book is the biography of a diminutive man who lived in large style, and lives on in George M. Cohan’s musical Little Johnny Jones and Ernest Hemingway’s short story “My Old Man.” The book is also much more―a fascinating cultural history that illuminates the history of horse racing and betting, the democratization of sport, changing conceptions of masculinity, the hypocrisy of Victorian morality, the lionizing and demonizing of celebrities, and a variety of other inviting topics.

About this title

Review:

It might seem like a long way from the elite ambiance of the opera house to the gritty atmosphere of the track, but in his biography of one of racing's most famous early jockeys, John Dizikes displays the same shrewd understanding of how culture operates in society that distinguished his Opera in America (winner of the 1993 National Book Critics Circle Award).

Tod Sloan (1874-1933) launched his career in California, became a favorite with fans, and emerged as the sport's dominant rider on the East Coast. Dandified clothes and a reputation as a ladies' man were part of his appeal, but Sloan's main claim to fame was technical: he popularized the forward seat, in which a jockey crouched on the neck of the horse, an innovation that revolutionized racing and within a few years obliterated the old upright style. It was derisively called the "monkey seat" in England, where Sloan triumphed in 1899 but made enemies with his Yankee brashness and flamboyance. The English were also apprehensive about American gamblers corrupting their races. Sloan, like many riders in the more freewheeling tracks back home, was inappropriately intimate with gamblers and may well have thrown races. In any case, he certainly wagered on them. In late 1900, England's all-powerful Jockey Club informed Sloan "he need not apply for a license to ride" in 1901. His days as a jockey were over. Dizikes uses Sloan's short but meteoric career to explore horse racing's evolution from aristocratic pastime to popular entertainment, casting Sloan as the forerunner of such 20th-century sports celebrities as Babe Ruth and Michael Jordan. --Wendy Smith

About the Author:

John Dizikes received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Opera in America, published by Yale University Press. He teaches at the University of California, Santa Cruz and is occasionally to be found at the Santa Anita race track.

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0300083343
• ISBN 13: 9780300083347
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240