It’s Not What You Know….. by Alan ‘Ginger’ Newman

FOREWORD…

My name is Alan ‘Ginger’ Newman.

Firstly, let me try and explain the reason I have attempted to write a blog on Star Sports which, when complete, will be my first book as well.

My granddaughter, Amy, who was 22 at the time, had just passed her exams at Birmingham University (with flying colours).

She now teaches science and biology at a local school with 1,400 students. For the last two years she had shared a house with four others girls. The girls have remained close friends, although they now live all over the country. One of the girls, Madie, has been half way round the world with my granddaughter, since they finished Uni.

On occasions, the girls would all try and stay at each others houses, so that they could find out the latest news from each other.

A date was arranged at my granddaughters.

My daughter Tracy asked if we (my wife Judy and I) would like to come to dinner, as we had met the girls, when we were visiting our granddaughter in Birmingham.

We accepted, it was early 2013.

After dinner, Madie, asked me ‘what do I do?’.

I replied, ‘a bit of this and a bit of that’. ‘No, what do you do?’ came the response.

Well I am semi-retired, but I still work in my nephew’s office a couple of days a week and a couple of nights at the dogs.

‘At the dogs, what do you mean?’.

I explained that that my father Harry ‘Ginger’ Newman was a bookmaker, who started making a book at the dogs in 1932, starting at the old Wembley Stadium, and that I started working on dog tracks ,when I was 16-years-old.

I started going to the dogs when I was just four-years-old.

‘The sound of that makes me very interested’ she said. ‘Tell me a story about your life on a dog track’.

I thought for a moment, then proceeded to relate a story.

When I finished, she said to me, that if I could put a story like that on paper, I could write a book.

So here goes.

The story I told was as follows.

BARRY…

It was when I was a bookmaker at Wembley Stadium (now gone).

Wembley race days were Monday and Fridays.

The stadium held 100,000 people, however on race days there would be around 4,000 present.

This particular night there were more than normal as a final of a competition was being held.

The incident I am going to tell you about was the race before the final. The greyhound in question was named Wailea Flash (how I remember the name I really can’t tell you, as now I can’t even remember what happened last Thursday!).

Wailea Flash was a slow starting railer, always drawn trap one or two, on this occasion it was drawn in the one box over a distance of 525 yards.

The owner of Wailea Flash was a man named Barry Silkman (right).

Barry was, and still is, a well known character on a dog track. He was the first Jewish person to play football in the premier league (then 1st division), he was a double glazing salesman, he was a greyhound dog trainer and today is one of the top football agents in the country. He told me he sold a football player for nine million pounds to a club, and that he had nearly a million pounds commission from it.

This story is when Barry was the greyhound trainer.

The hare started, as the traps opened trap 1 Wailea Flash slipped, he lost a couple of lengths and instead of being his usual three or four lengths adrift he was more like five or six lengths behind. The hare had gone round the first bend before he reached it. However he must of caught sight of it through the gap in the rails and instead of going round the first bend he cut through the rails and charged across the centre of the track. As he did this he ran into the track light post, with a mighty thud and collapsed without moving.

Barry was at the other side of the track, where the dogs are collected after the race, seeing what happened he raced over to where the dog was still lying, the race itself was now over.

Barry stood over the dog just looking at it, it still had not moved.

Barry then sunk down to his knees, as he did so the whole of the stadium went silent, he placed his hands under the dog like a cradle, he then stood up, as he did so the dogs legs fell in different directions.

The dog was dead.

Barry started to walk back to the kennels, with the dog in his arms. As he passed the main stands he was crying out loud with tears running down his face, it is something i will never forget.

ABOUT ME…

I am now 74-years-old.  I have been going greyhound racing since I was a four-year-old and since I can remember have always been involved in the gambling business.

From being a bookmaker on greyhound tracks to owning betting shops and casinos.

My first memory of greyhound racing was when I was just four. It was at the Empire Stadium, Wembley.

How can I remember that? Well the reason was I fell down the stone steps and cracked my head open. (still have the scar to this day.)

The only other thing I remember was that it was an afternoon meeting. I didn’t know they had evening meetings at that time.

My father, Harry ‘Ginger’ Newman ) was a bookmaker there. He started making a book at Wembley in 1932. We, (him and me) continued, for another 60 years when I was forced to leave (but that’s another story).

Ok. Let’s start with the things I recall…..

I was 16, not old enough to work at Wimbledon greyhound track where my father made a book on Wednesdays and Fridays. The management, run by Johns Cearns, was one of the best but also one of the strictest. Their rules were that you had to be 18 to get in, so my father stopped me from going as he did not want to upset them.

I started working at the following tracks ….

The Empire Stadium Wembley (now the new Wembley Stadium)
Hackney Wick (now the Olympic Stadium)
Clapton (now a housing estate)
Park Royal (now an industrial estate)
Haringey (now a Sainsburys)
White City (now the BBC)
Stamford Bridge ( still Chelsea’s football ground but no dogs)

Other tracks came later.

My first real job was at hackney Wick, I worked for a man known as Issy Tits, his name was Israel Rosenberg.

He was known as ‘tits’ because of his massive chest, which he acquired as a young boy.

My father told me how he got it. Issy would get up early every day, and go swimming for at least an hour and a half before school and the same again after school.

In those days it seemed that most people had a nickname.

A few of the ones I remember at the Wick were….

One Armed Lou. Yep he only had arm, his job was as a tic tac (hand signals, see pic), he and George Knight had worked out their own system.

Skinny who was. Fatty who was, Darkie who was a sailor and lots more whose names will come up in other chapters.

My job working for Issy was as a floorman/bagman, this entailed me telling him the prices other bookmakers were laying and also paying out after the race.

Issy was a very good clerk, the man who registers the bets in a ledger but as a bookmaker the less said the better.
He worked with my father at Wembley and Wimbledon.

My wages at Hackney Wick were £1 a meeting when he won but zero when he lost. When I went home my father would always ask how he went, if I told him that issy had lost, my father would give me the £1.

From that £1 I had to pay my expenses. We lived in Stanmore and my journey to the Wick was as follows: catch a bus from Stanmore to Edgware (not Edgware Road !) underground station, then the train to Old Street, where I would catch a bus to the Wick.

I can’t remember how much it cost, but I do remember that I had to allow two hours to get there, when i got to the stadium I ‘jibbed’ in (found a way of getting in for nothing).

Getting home is another story. The Wick raced on Thursday afternoons and Saturday mornings.

On Thursdays, when racing had finished, the man nicknamed sailor would give me a lift to White City where I worked for my father and placed bets for an assortment of punters, more about them later.

On Saturdays it was different. When racing had finished, we would go to Stamford Hill to a restaurant named Monteginos (it is still there). They did a three course lunchtime special for 4 shillings and 11 pence (25 pence in todays money) including a drink.

When we had finished we made our way to Stamford Bridge, where racing started around 4-30 and finished around 6-30.

Floodlight football started around 1957 at Chelsea, the Saturday home fixture would be over by 3pm.

Soon as the last race was run we were all off to White City, it only took 15 minutes at the most in those days and the first race was 7.30 pm.

I’m sorry, I keep getting away from the Wick.

Meantime, my eldest brother who was also working at the Wick as our tic tac man asked me the price of the six dog. I showed him it was 3/1, in sign language, and he asked me to have a £1 on it, his wages were the same as mine and the dog won.

That afternoon he went on to back five winners out of five. The same evening, at White City, I placed a bet for him with a bookmaker named Nat Newman (no relation, a great gambler) on a dog named Pigalle Wonder (in my top five greyhounds). The odds were 2/7, that means if you have £700 on you win £200. My brother’s bet was £2100 on it – it won – my brother had turned a £1 bet into nearly £3,000 in a single day. The average yearly, yes yearly, wage was around £3,500.

My father found out a few days later, he barred him from racing forever.

In those days there were around 40 bookmakers at the track, among the names I remember were Fatty Walters. He had the best pitch, it was by the winning line. He never put a raincoat or overcoat on. I remember it was snowing one day, he stood there with his jacket unbuttoned and shirt undone down to the waist. Funny the things you do remember.

Some of the others bookmakers were Raphy Magnus, Gerald and Lou Springer, Joe Magnus also two brothers, one was named Judah, the other one i don’t recall his name. You would always know when they lost on a race as they would start screaming at each other, then one of them would kick the other one quite hard, the punters loved it !!

Now to the day that finished my career at the wick.

Issy’s pitch at the wick was on the last bend, it was about 100 yards from the finishing line, unless you stood in the stands it was hard to see much of the race from where we bet.

It came to the last race on a Saturday morning. As usual Issy was doing his ‘proverbials’. He had £62 left, the favourite was a dog named The Sultan (never forget this one) always drawn trap six, its price was evens. Issy laid the £62 he had left.

The race was over 550 yards, the start was in front of us. Up goes the lid and within a flash the dogs are on their way. From where we were standing we could not see them until they turned the second bend, when they came into view it was traps 1 and 3 who were two lengths in front of traps 4 and 5 who were a length in front of trap 2 with the sultan bringing up the rear. They continued down the back straight maintaining the same order and as they came round the last bend in front of us with about a 100 yards to go it was trap 1 by three lengths from 3-4-5 with 2 a further length back and The Sultan another 2 lengths behind.

The crowd in the stands were shouting and cheering, when all of a sudden it turned into a roar (did I mention The Sultan was a strong finisher?).

The loudspeaker announced that it was a photo finish As I have said, from where we stood, we did not know who was in the photo. Before we had time to find out what dogs were involved in the photo, the announcement came .

First…….trap 6 The Sultan
Second…….. Well I will never know because I froze. The next thing I recall was turning around and seeing Issy hurling the joint (tools ) onto the track.

Goodbye Hackney Wick.

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The next blog from Alan in the It’s Not What You Know series will appear on Thursday 27 November.