{"product_id":"9781456840785","title":"The History Of Greyhound Racing In New England","description":"Chapter One           Greyhound Racing  Comes To New England     Before pari-mutuel greyhound racing came to New England in the mid-1930’s it  had a long uphill battle to  overcome the region’s puritanical resistance to gambling  and what many felt was a moral injustice inherent in the sport which was promulgated by the  image  of dogs hunting down rabbits in what was known as coursing.     With these objections in mind it is necessary to write  a brief history of  the reasons why the  greyhound  first came to  America and  how  greyhound racing came about and evolved into a flourishing sport.  Later chapters will explain in depth  how  its critics and changing consumer  tastes  eventually  brought the  sport down.                       A Brief History    With the great western migrations of  the mid-nineteenth century  and the increased use of farmlands  to feed the growing populations came  the problem of protecting  the crops from  jackrabbits was paramount. The solution came from the  railroad workers and settlers, many of whom  emigrated from England and Ireland and were familiar with the greyhounds and their hunting  skills. They began importing  greyhounds  and selling them to the farmers where they  became valuable economic assets by keeping the rabbits  away from their cash crops.   Another purchaser was the U. S. Cavalry, including  George Armstrong  Custer, who utilized their skills for scouting  enemy movement  and hunting down game.  Sources say that Custer coursed his greyhounds the night before the 1876 Battle of Little Big Horn and that the dogs  survived  the next day’s battle.                               Meanwhile, the farmers, looking for entertainment diversions, started  racing their greyhounds  in what were called “coursing meets” in which the greyhounds chased a live rabbit. Gambling at these meets was  extensive.  Coursing’s popularity spread rapidly, and not just in the farmlands.  There even were meets in such locations as the mill towns  of Lawrence and Lowell, Massachusetts and, of course, gambling  was part of the action.      There was also a spreading  humanitarian backlash to coursing . As Frank G. Menke wrote in the 1942 edition of “The Encyclopedia of Sports”, “Opposition to this form of sport developed. The humane people of the state rebelled at the idea of  killing  of the rabbit  just to perpetuate a gambling diversion. They implored officials to make coursing null  and void—and this was accomplished.”                 The Mechanical Lure          The next giant step to overcoming these objections  and turning greyhound racing into a  sport that quieted many of the humanitarian objections was  accomplished by a gentleman named Owen Patrick Smith. He is one of the key figures in the history of the sport and was  profiled in a long  Aug. 27, 1973  “Sports Illustrated”  article by  Robert Cantwell.   O. P. Smith (1869-1927), as he came to be known,  was once hired to organize a coursing  meet to promote the city of Hot Springs. He then turned his full attention to the invention of a mechanical  lure for greyhound racing and in 1910  was granted a patent for the “Inanimate Hare Conveyor”.  His breakthrough came at Emeryville, CA where a  boxing promoter  and businessman named George Sawyer built a track in 1919,  utilizing the new device.      In his Sports Illustrated article Cantwell writes of “the 1,600 pounds of machinery to carry a one-pound rabbit”  which at times jumped the rail.  Smith had another problem                         with the dogmen, Cantwell relates. They were of the belief that their greyhounds would feel deceived once they knew they were not chasing a live rabbit and never run ag","brand":"Xlibris Corporation","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47135244091632,"sku":"9781456840785","price":8.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781456840785_p0.jpg?v=1763864515","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781456840785","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}