Samuel Anthony Boulmetis Sr. (February 17, 1927 - May 30, 2021) was an American thoroughbred horse racing jockey who was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1973. The Hall's induction biography says that "His peers described him as an honest and intelligent rider, qualities he later demonstrated as a racing official and state steward for New Jersey."
Born in Baltimore, the son of a Greek tailor, Sam Boulmetis began his involvement in the horse racing industry as a stable hand at Laurel Park Racecourse in Laurel, Maryland. He began riding professionally in late 1948 and earned his first win in 1949 at Garden State Park then went on to win that year's riding championship at Monmouth Park Racetrack. He repeated as the leading jockey at Monmouth Park in 1953, 1955, and 1956.
The winner of numerous important races, Boulmetis won the Arlington Classic twice and the prestigious Washington, D.C. International Stakes and Canadian International Stakes, forerunners to the Breeders' Cup races which drew the best horses to the United States and Canada from around the world. For owner Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, he rode Fisherman in the 1956 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe at Longchamp Racecourse in Paris, France. Among the other notable horses he rode was Hall of Fame inductee Tosmah with whom he won seven stakes races. In the 1955 Massachusetts Handicap, Boulmetis rode Helioscope to a track record time of 2:01 for 1¼ miles on dirt, unbroken as of 2008.
Throughout his career Sam Boulmetis raced primarily at tracks on the East Coast of the United States. He retired from riding after the 1966 season and in 1969 was appointed a steward at Monmouth Park Racetrack in Oceanport, New Jersey. He retired in 2004 from his duties as a racing official and state steward for the State of New Jersey.
His son, Sam Boulmetis Jr., followed in his footsteps, becoming a professional jockey in 1973 and riding until 1981 when a racing accident left him paralyzed from the waist down. Sam Jr. is now a steward at Philadelphia Park Racetrack.
Sam Boulmetis' nephew is jockey Tony Black.
George Edward Arcaro, was an American Thoroughbred horse racing Hall of Fame jockey who won more American classic races than any other jockey in history and is the only rider to have won the U.S. Triple Crown twice. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest jockeys in the history of American Thoroughbred horse racing. Arcaro was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, the son of an impoverished taxi driver. His parents, Pasquale and Josephine, were Italian immigrants and his father held a number of jobs, including taxi driver and operator of an illegal liquor enterprise during Prohibition. Arcaro was born prematurely, and weighed just three pounds at birth; because of this, he was smaller than his classmates and was rejected when he tried out for a spot on a baseball team. His full height would reach just five-foot, two inches. Eventually nicknamed "Banana Nose" by his confreres, Arcaro won his first race in 1932 at the Agua Caliente racetrack in Tijuana, Mexico; he was 16 years old. In 1934, the inaugural year of Narragansett Park, Arcaro was a comparative unknown who rode many of his early career races at 'Gansett.
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