Dusty Relics of Arkansas History

October 14-20, 2019

By Bob Denman
bgdenman@ualr.edu

 

Lonnie Clayton

 

There are only two examples of high Queen Anne style architecture in North Little Rock today. You may have seen the historic Engleberger House standing at 2105 Maple just south of North Little Rock High School. Placed on the National Historic Register in 1912, few remember the thoroughbred racing super star who built it.

 

His name was Alonzo “Lonnie” Clayton. He moved to North Little Rock at age 10 and within a few years became an up and coming jockey that eventually became one of the highest salaried riders on the East Coast. In 1892, 15-year-old Clayton road Azra to the wire becoming the youngest jockey in history to win the Kentucky Derby. 

 

If you ever wanted to go to the track and bet on a jockey, then Lonnie Clayton was your man. The following year he won the riding title at Churchill Downs and the next season won a whopping 144 races finishing in the money sixty percent of the time. He won the Arkansas Derby at Clinton Park in 1895, Clinton Park the home track of the Little Rock Jockey Club. No doubt he rode often at Clinton Park which sat roughly where Adams Field was later built in 1917. 

 

In 1894, Clayton purchased his parents, Robert and Evaline, a large farm in what today is Sherwood and constructed commercial buildings on Main Street in North Little Rock. He built his Queen Anne home, described as the finest home north of the river, in 1895. Clayton was destined to be one of the best the sport has ever seen but two events relegated him to racing obscurity.

 

First, he was a black man when racism razed its ugly head in the thoroughbred racing industry as stable owners felt the social pressure to eliminate African American jockeys in favor of white jockeys. Second and shortly after, a national wave of anti-gambling sentiment swept the country shutting down tracks across the country including those in Arkansas. Clayton’s family moved to California in 1899 where he spent his last years working as a hotel bellhop. He died of tuberculosis at age 41 just a few years before horse racing’s big comeback during the Roaring 20’s.

 

Found in pencil, in the attic of his old home on Maple Street are his name, the names of his brothers and sisters, Mama and Papa Clayton, the drawing of a jockey, the date 1899, and one final word, a simple “Goodbye.”

 

Alonzo Lonnie Clayton, a Dusty Relic of Arkansas and American thoroughbred racing history. 

 

PHOTO CAPTION:

 

Alonzo “Lonnie” Clayton was described by author Edward Hotaling, as “one of the great riders of the New York circuit all through the 1890s” and holds the record as the youngest jockey to ever win the Kentucky Derby.  (Source: Public Domain) 

 

  • Bob Denman
    Bob Denman