You Can Bet There’ll Be Autograph Chances

If you get the chance, ask a celebrity for an autograph at the Kentucky Derby. You might be surprised.

Pete Rose signed his name to a Churchill Downs program at the Derby a few years ago. Rose added the number 4,256.

“That’s my prison number,” he said with a wink, having done a stretch for income tax evasion.

Actually, 4,256 represents Rose’s hit total, the number he achieved as he broke Ty Cobb’s record.

Walter Cronkite has been to a Derby or two.

He signs his name, “Wally Cronkite.”

Wally Cronkite? Just doesn’t have the ring of a news icon.

When Richard Nixon was president, he attended the 1969 Derby. No record of him signing any autographs, but he did say:

“I wanted to be here when the band played ‘My Old Kentucky Home.’ I watch the Derby on television every year, and I think that’s the best part.”

“My Old Kentucky Home” is guaranteed to bring a throat lump or two, played as the horses parade onto the track before about 150,000. But most people probably would say that the finish of the race is the best part.

Actor Dick Van Patten, a regular figure at tracks in Southern California, where he has raced his own horses, has been to the Derby.

“I’d rather have a bad day [betting] at the Derby than a good day anywhere else,” Van Patten said.

President Gerald Ford estimated that he attended the Derby at least 10 times. Apparently without too much success at the windows.

“I’m a great contributor to the welfare of the Commonwealth of Kentucky,” Ford said.