Jockey Don Pierce is inducted into Racing Hall of Fame

SARATOGA SPRINGS - Making it in Oklahoma during the 1930s was a long shot. Amid the Great Depression, drought turned much of the Sooner State into a dust bowl, forcing farmers to abandon their land.

Don Pierce was born April 13, 1937, in Clebit, out in the middle of nowhere in Oklahoma's southeast corner, near the Texas and Arkansas borders. It was timber country, and his father was a mechanic on a logging truck. Like the dispossessed farmers, the loggers were rootless, too, as was their company town. Its name didn't change, but its location did.

"It was a moving town. When the logging ended in one area, the whole town moved to a new logging area," Pierce said. "So there were a lot of Clebits."

His family relocated to a place with many more big trees than Oklahoma: Oregon. That's where Pierce began a career that led him to the Racing Hall of Fame, in which he was inducted Friday.

"When I was twelve years old riding match races in Levis and sneakers at county fairs in Oregon and Northern California," he said, "I never thought it could lead to something like this. I had a lot of good things happen to me, but this tops them all. Fun trip I've had, I'll tell you."

Little of it was planned. At 16 Pierce was working on a cattle and sheep ranch in Gold Beach, Ore., where a man whose name he can't remember suggested he become a jockey. Pierce was short, light and had no other ambitions, so why not? His mother gave him bus fare because she didn't want him hitchhiking to Southern California, but Pierce pocketed the money and thumbed his way to Hollywood Park. By the time he showed up, its meet had ended, so he continued south to Del Mar.

Pierce was a hot-walker before trainer Jack Howard schooled him in the basics of race riding. Pierce drifted to tracks in Las Vegas and Phoenix, where he hooked up with trainer A.J. Horn. He was headed for New Mexico, and Pierce tagged along. On June 13, 1954, opening day at Ruidoso Downs, he rode Supplier in the first race. He won. "It changed my life."

At 17, he was on his way. He would have 3,545 more winners - 351 in stakes - during the next 30 years, when he made his mark in one of the toughest jockey colonies in history. Among his rivals in Southern California were all-time greats Laffit Pincay Jr., Bill Shoemaker, Chris McCarron and Eddie Delahoussaye.

"Don was a big-time money rider," fellow Hall of Fame jockey John Rotz said. "He was super confident. I don't believe he ever thought he was on a long shot."

The easygoing Pierce's sharp sense of humor made him popular with his competitors. They regarded him so highly that in 1967 he was voted the George Woolf Award, which honors a rider whose career and conduct exemplify the best in racing. Pierce was no choirboy, though. He was a relentless golf hustler back then, and at 73 still is.

"Don is a funny guy, a good guy to hang out with," Rotz said. "Everybody in the jocks' room liked him."

Especially the late Shoemaker, who shared Pierce's passion for golf and became his best friend. The Shoe would have loved to see his pal make the Hall after waiting 26 years.

Rotz presented Pierce Friday and spoke of the exponential rise in purses since they retired. "I wouldn't have minded going for some of this Breeders' Cup money," Rotz said, drawing laughs, "but Don said he didn't care. Don said he thought he rode in the best times in racing."