Author Continues Promoting Book, Story Of Old-Time Jockey

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ When the movie ``Seabiscuit'' became a box-office hit in 2003, author Richard Maturi decided another horse racing story should be told _ that of a Hall of Fame jockey who is

Sunday, August 26th 2007, 6:49 pm

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ When the movie ``Seabiscuit'' became a box-office hit in 2003, author Richard Maturi decided another horse racing story should be told _ that of a Hall of Fame jockey who is one of the elite few who rode a Triple Crown winner.

If Earl Sande's name doesn't resonate with today's average racing fan, Maturi believes it should, and he's made it a personal quest to make that happen.

Maturi's biography of Sande _ who rode Gallant Fox in 1930 as the horse swept the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes and became the sport's second Triple Crown winner _ was released in May 2005, the 75th anniversary of Gallant Fox's Derby win.

Since then, Maturi and his wife, Mary, have traveled from their home in Wyoming to racetracks all over the United States and Canada, promoting the book, ``Triple Crown Saga: The Earl Sande Saga, Tragedy to Triumph.''

``We're dedicated to getting his story out,'' Maturi said while sitting behind a table full of books at Remington Park, where he and his wife, Mary, spent parts of Saturday and Sunday.

The next step is to translate Sande's story to the movie screen. Maturi said he's recently hired an agent to promote the screenplay to filmmakers, and he remains optimistic about the chances of seeing the story become a feature-length film.

``After 'Seabiscuit' came out, we said, 'We've really got to tell Earl's story.' It's just as good as Seabiscuit's, if not better, from the human perspective,'' Maturi said. ``The more we got to do research on Earl, he was just a special guy, and we've just kind of taken up his cause.''

Maturi, 60, has written 21 books and more than 1,200 articles for national and regional publications, many of which have to do with investments. But he said the first article he ever wrote was about Sande, who was born in South Dakota before his family moved to Idaho when Sande was 9.

``I was in a library (in Idaho) and I found this folder on him,'' Maturi said. ``I just kept looking at the headlines _ 'Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey, Earl Sande.' So I did this article on him and it was the first thing I ever sold as a freelancer. He started my career, so I figure one of the last things I want to do is resurrect his.''

Sande's professional riding career began in 1918 at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans, and he rode the best horses of his era. He served as a substitute rider for the legendary Man o' War and also rode the first Triple Crown winner, Sir Barton _ albeit not when that horse won the Derby, Preakness and Belmont in 1919.

In 1923, Sande scored his first Derby win, aboard Zev. The next year, a spill in a race at Saratoga Race Course in New York almost killed Sande, but he recovered and won the 1925 Derby aboard Flying Ebony.

Sande retired in 1929 but returned to ride Gallant Fox in 1930 _ the year the term ``Triple Crown'' became part of the sport's vernacular.

Sande's win in the 1930 Preakness was his only one in that event, but he won the Belmont five times. Only two other jockeys, James McLaughlin and Eddie Arcaro, have more Belmont wins than Sande, and only Arcaro, Bill Hartack and Bill Shoemaker have won the Kentucky Derby more times.

According to the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame, Sande was the nation's leading rider in 1921, 1923 and 1927. Sande won 968 races in 3,673 starts, a winning percentage of 26.4. Maturi said Sande's mounts finished in the money _ either first, second or third _ 60.9 percent of the time.

Maturi said Sande's astonishing level of success is probably why famed sportswriter Damon Runyon often wrote poetry about the jockey, which usually included the line, ``Gimme a handy guy like Sande.'' Oklahoma humorist Will Rogers, one of the era's most colorful figures, also wrote about Sande, Maturi said.

After retiring as a jockey, Sande had success as a trainer. He became America's leading trainer in 1938 thanks in good part to his work with champion 3-year-old Stagehand, a horse that beat Seabiscuit in that year's Santa Anita Handicap.

Sande staged a brief comeback as a rider in 1953, at age 54, beating Arcaro _ the only jockey to ride two Triple Crown winners _ by a half-length in what proved to be Sande's final race. In 1955, he was in the first class of inductees into the thoroughbred racing Hall of Fame. Sande died at age 69 in Oregon in August 1968 and is buried there in Salem.

``It's just such a great story,'' Mary Matura said. ``You couldn't make up the characters that surround him.''

Since his career ended, Sande's fame became eclipsed by that of other jockeys, including Arcaro, Shoemaker, George Woolf and Laffit Pincay Jr., and Sande's accomplishments faded from memory. But Scott Wells, Remington Park's general manager and a former trainer, said Sande's name should be well-known to fans of the sport.

``Eddie Arcaro, (William) Saunders, Shoemaker, all those guys told me that Sande was the guy. He was the greatest rider of his time,'' Wells said. ``He was a legend in his time, in the golden era of American racing, and at a time when American racing was really taking its place.''

Richard Maturi hopes that his book, and the possible movie, will make Sande's name as familiar as that of Seabiscuit.

``A lot of of the people at the tracks don't know the history of what they're watching,'' he said. ``Surprisingly, a lot of people working at the tracks don't, either. ... He's a hero. He just had a way with horses.''