They'll run the Belmont Stakes a week from today out on Long Island. After that, the vast majority of Americans will forget about the sport of thoroughbred racing for another 11 months.
Arkansas has more than its share of serious racing fans compared with other states. In Arkansas--a place with no big-league professional teams in football, baseball, basketball or hockey--thoroughbred racing is the only sport in which the state is truly in the major leagues. That might not be the case had Eric Jackson and Bobby Geiger not taken a trip to an island in the Chesapeake Bay in February 1998.
Jackson, who stepped down earlier this year after three decades as the general manager at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, was joined by Geiger, his director of gaming and wagering, on a flight to Baltimore that winter. They then boarded a small boat that was bound for Parsons Island, a 100-acre retreat the Baltimore Sun once described as a "bucolic, privately owned island covered in corn and sunflowers and with scattered wildlife." The island was owned at the time by Jim Corckran, who had teamed up with his brother and a business partner two years earlier to purchase AmTote International Inc., which specialized in the equipment used to control pari-mutuel betting at horse and greyhound racing facilities.
"It was dark, it was sleeting and Bobby and I just had on our suits," Jackson told me several years ago. "We were freezing. We also knew we had a lot of work ahead of us. It was like a think tank out on that island. There were all kinds of people there. We worked for about 36 straight hours. It became known as the Parsons Island Project. You can still find old files around here labeled P.I.P."
Jackson was searching for a way to keep Oaklawn viable in the face of increased casino competition from surrounding states. Knowing that he had to do something to counter the proliferation of casinos in Mississippi, Louisiana and Oklahoma, Jackson came up with the concept of Instant Racing, an electronic gambling system that allows players to bet on replays of past races. During its 1999 session, the Arkansas Legislature removed the requirement that simulcast races be shown live, opening the door for Instant Racing. The first test terminals were placed on the floor at Oaklawn and at Southland Greyhound Park in West Memphis in January 2000. By 2002, the concept was taking off in Arkansas.
In 2005, the Legislature passed an act permitting Oaklawn and Southland to install "games of skill" such as electronic blackjack and electronic poker if approved by the city or county. More than 60 percent of West Memphis voters approved the games for Southland, and work began there in late 2006 on a $40 million expansion. It took longer in Hot Springs, where local politics are always complicated. The public referendum passed by just 89 votes in November 2005. Litigation ensued, and expansion was delayed until the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled in September 2007 that the law authorizing Oaklawn to add expanded games of skill was constitutional. Oaklawn began construction of its gaming facility on the day after the Arkansas Derby in April 2008. Purses have soared since then as Oaklawn uses part of the proceeds from its gaming operation to improve the quality of racing.
Jackson, a Hot Springs native who grew up playing golf on the par-three course that once was on the Oaklawn infield, graduated from Hendrix College at Conway with degrees in business and economics. I joined Jackson, 66, for lunch recently in the Oaklawn gaming facility, and he told me that he began thinking about semi-retirement following a visit with Bill Bissett, who had been president of Delaware North Cos., the giant entertainment conglomerate that owns Southland Park. During a dinner in Little Rock several years ago, Bissett told Jackson that he should consider slowing down and plan for a smooth transition. With the blessing of the Cella family of St. Louis, Oaklawn's owners, Jackson did just that. A nationwide search resulted in the hiring of Wayne Smith, a Rhode Island native who had worked for ITT Sheraton, MGM Grand, Caesar's Entertainment, Empire City Racing & Gaming, and Penn Gaming. Smith moved to Hot Springs in early 2016 and spent a year learning everything he could from Jackson before becoming only the sixth general manager in Oaklawn's 113-year history.
Jackson moved to an office down the hall and will stay at Oaklawn to work on special projects as senior vice president. But he will also travel the state with his wife Lynda and spend time in his new role as a member of the state Parks, Recreation and Travel Commission.
Jackson said: "Lynda and I are both from this state and love Arkansas. Now we'll get to see it the way we've always wanted to." As a member of the commission, he will be able to offer shrewd advice to Kane Webb, the director of the Department of Parks and Tourism who once covered races at Oaklawn for the Arkansas Democrat.
Jackson has been heartened by the renaissance of downtown Hot Springs that began after the 2014 fire that destroyed the Majestic Hotel. "The debris of that fire sat there for a long time, but it served as a catalyst to get other things moving," he said. "We still have a long way to go, but our market research at Oaklawn consistently shows that people love coming to Hot Springs. We've got the whole package here. I think we're finally seeing some resolve by the leadership in this county to make things better for those visitors. If we've learned anything through the years, it's that you can't take things for granted."
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Senior Editor Rex Nelson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He's also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried.com.
Editorial on 06/03/2017