That is information that you really have no need to know, and that is of absolutely no value to you. But there is other information that will be helpful to you – will help you put everything on context. Let’s get started (as Fareed would say).

First, COVID. The Washington Jewish Week puts out one polling question every week. I always look and virtually always answer, and sometimes find the question important. Today’s question was whether or not COVID had any effect on your celebration of Rosh Hashanah over the weekend. Now, you know what my answer was. But…..

40% of respondents said that COVID had an effect on their observances this year!! You think we are beyond the pandemic? Ha!

So, it’s now been 10 days since I had my first symptoms and (barring a reaction from the Paxlovid), the CDC and my physician tell me that I am almost certainly not contagious, and that I can go about my business, even without masking. I took them at their word, and decided to go out for a short walk yesterday. Really short – four blocks in one direction, four blocks back. Flat terrain. Certainly not a quick pace.

I felt fine on my walk. But when I got back, I soon felt exhausted, lay down and fell asleep for almost an hour, and felt the rest of the day like I had moved two steps backwards. So, I am going to go slow. Slow.

Second, St. Louis. If you don’t know anything about St. Louis, what I am about to say may be again be of no interest. But – I am not sure – maybe it will be. It’s about horses.

The general subject is horse racing. At the start of the 20th century, horse racing was the most popular sport in the United States. And in St. Louis itself, there were at least three tracks. One track was in South St. Louis (it was the first track ever to have electric lit night racing). Another, the St. Louis Fairgrounds track, was where the Forest Park Community College is now located and where the St. Louis Highlands Amusement Park was located while I was growing up. And the third, Delmar Garden, was located near the University City Loop.

Each of these race tracks went out of business during the first decade of the 20th century, when “progressives” took over the government of the State of Missouri (hard to believe, I know) and ended most forms of legal gambling. The owners of the track (the same group owned all three tracks, as I understand it) were not hurt because the land had become very valuable, and was ready for development.

In University City, the track had been located near the U. City Loop (close to the Washington University campus), north of Delmar. The track site was developed with red brick mid-rise apartments, which became the home to many Jewish families, among others. My mother, for example, was raised on Enright, and my father lived on Cates, both streets in this general area (although I don’t know the exact boundaries of the track and track-related buildings, and there was also a neighboring amusement park and outdoor theater and other facilities.). But you may be familiar with the streets Eastgate and Westgate. I never thought about these names as being reflective of what were the two largest entrances to a race track. But that is what they were.

And who owned these race tracks? It was an organization known as C.A.T. , which was owned by three men, Louis Cella (his family house was on Delmar across from my grandparents’ house in the 7100 block), Samuel Adler and Andrew “Cap” Tilles. You may know of Tilles, because of Tilles Park in Ladue on land he donated to the city of St. Louis, which the city later sold to St. Louis County, using the proceeds to build another Tilles Park in South St. Louis. Or of the Rosalie Tilles Non-Sectarian Foundation, which continues to provide university scholarships and educational support in St. Louis (its non-sectarian nature was assured by its requiring at least one rabbi and the Catholic archbishop to be members of its Board of Directors). Tilles himself was a member of the St. Louis Jewish community, as was his relative Adler; Cella was ethnically Italian.

But there’s more. At one point, Tilles monopolized horse racing everywhere in the country except on the two coasts. Only Churchill Downs in Louisville and a track in Chicago were outside of the Tilles empire in non-coastal America. And, of course, in addition to the tracks, there was the gambling.

Earlier this month, when we were in Saratoga Springs, we went to the National Horse Racing Museum and Hall of Fame. Maybe I missed it, but I don’t remember any reference to Tilles. If he is not mentioned, I wonder why.

I am going to do a little research on this. Maybe I will tell you what I discover.