Earl Dew (May 2, 1921 – February 2, 1941) was an American champion jockey in the sport of

thoroughbred The Thoroughbred is a horse breed best known for its use in horse racing. Although the word ''thoroughbred'' is sometimes used to refer to any breed of purebred horse, it technically refers only to the Thoroughbred breed. Thoroughbreds are c ...

horse racing Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic p ...

who was being hailed as one of the most promising riders of his generation when he died at age 19 as a result of a racing accident.

Early life

Earl Dew was born in

Sac City, Iowa Sac City is a city in and the county seat of Sac County, Iowa, United States, located just southwest of the eastern intersection of U.S. Routes 20 and 71 in the rolling hills along the valley of the North Raccoon River. The city is one of 45 d ...

, the son of John Dew and his wife Mable Hass. His father raced horses in the

Midwestern United States The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of the United States. I ...

and Earl, under his father's tutelage, learned to ride at an early age.

Career

He began his professional career in 1937 and by 1938 was making a name for himself when he competed at tracks such as

Sportsman's Park Sportsman's Park was the name of several former Major League Baseball ballpark structures in St. Louis, Missouri. All but one of these were located on the same piece of land, at the northwest corner of Grand Boulevard and Dodier Street, on the ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. Later that year, Dew was the leading rider at

Fair Grounds Race Course Fair Grounds Race Course, often known as New Orleans Fair Grounds, is a thoroughbred racetrack and racino in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is operated by Churchill Downs Louisiana Horseracing Company, LLC. As early as 1838 Bernard de Marigny, Ju ...

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

until he was sidelined with a broken leg as a result of a November 29 racing accident. In 1939, Dew rode at

Santa Anita Park Santa Anita Park is a Thoroughbred racetrack in Arcadia, California, United States. It offers some of the prominent horse racing events in the United States during early fall, winter and in spring. The track is home to numerous prestigious races ...

Bay Meadows Bay Meadows was a horse racing Race track, track in San Mateo, California from 1934 until 2008, in the San Francisco Bay Area in the United States of America, United States. History Built on the site of an old airfield, Bay Meadows Racecourse w ...

and

Tanforan The Shops at Tanforan is a regional shopping mall in San Bruno, California, United States. It is located on the San Francisco Peninsula, south of San Francisco city limits. The site was originally used as a horse racing track from 1899 until 1 ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, plus at

Agua Caliente Racetrack Agua means water in Spanish. Agua may also refer to: Places * ''Agua de Dios'' (God's water), a municipality in Colombia * Volcán de Agua, a stratovolcano located in Guatemala Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Agua'' (film), a 2006 Argentin ...

Tijuana, Mexico Tijuana ( ,"Tijuana"
(US) and < ...

Championship year

In 1940, Dew captivated

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

n racing fans when he and fellow 19-year-old jockey Walter Lee Taylor battled for that year's riding title and were tied with two days left on the calendar. In what ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' described as the "Transcontinental Struggle for American Championship," Dew was competing at

in Tijuana, Mexico, and Taylor at

Tropical Park Race Track Tropical Park Race Track was a horse racing facility built on at the current intersection of Bird Road and the Palmetto Expressway in Southwest Dade Miami part of metropolitan Miami, Florida and what is now Olympia Heights. The race track was ...

Coral Gables, Florida Coral Gables, officially City of Coral Gables, is a city in Miami-Dade County, Florida. The city is located southwest of Downtown Miami. As of the 2020 U.S. census, it had a population of 49,248. Coral Gables is known globally as home to the ...

. On the final day, Earl Dew captured the 1940 national championship with 287 wins, one more than his opponent who had been injured in a fall during the same day. The January 16, 1941 ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' reported that Dew said the best horse he rode in 1940 was

Mioland Mioland (1937–1951) was an American Champion Thoroughbred racehorse. Bred in Oregon by H. W. Ray, he was out of the mare Iolanda. His German-born sire was Mio D'Arezzo, a winner of the Deutsches St. Leger who had been imported to stand at ...

, a colt bred and raced that year by a man named H. W. Ray. On January 7, 1941, Iowa native sons Earl Dew and

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

star

Bob Feller Robert William Andrew Feller (November 3, 1918 – December 15, 2010), nicknamed "the Heater from Van Meter", "Bullet Bob", and "Rapid Robert", was an American baseball pitcher who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Clevel ...

were honored at ceremonies in the state capital of

Des Moines Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...

. On February 2, Dew was at the Agua Caliente Racetrack for a gold watch presentation in recognition of his 1940 jockey's championship clinched at that track. He was riding in the sixth race when he was involved in a three-horse accident and died of a

cerebral hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as cerebral bleed, intraparenchymal bleed, and hemorrhagic stroke, or haemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain, into its ventricles, or into both. It is one kind of bleed ...

resulting from a

fractured skull A skull fracture is a break in one or more of the eight bones that form the cranial portion of the skull, usually occurring as a result of blunt force trauma. If the force of the impact is excessive, the bone may fracture at or near the site of t ...

while en route to hospital. On March 3 a special ceremony was held in his memory at

Death

Dew was killed on February 2, 1941 in a horse race in

Tijuana Tijuana ( ,"Tijuana"
(US) and < ...

, Mexico.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dew, Earl 1921 births 1941 deaths American jockeys American Champion jockeys Jockeys who died while racing People from Sac City, Iowa Sport deaths in Mexico