HOT SPRINGS - Growing up in Hot Springs approximately 50 years ago, Eric Jackson and his younger sister, Ceci, said they often remember their father leaving shortly after midnight to make the near 200-mile drive to Memphis to pick up the Daily Racing Form, horse racing's bible for handicappers.
Times have changed, but the source of the delivery hasn't.
It's still the Jackson way.
For roughly 100 years, a member of the Jackson family has been responsible for distribution of the Form at sites throughout Hot Springs, including Oaklawn Park, which opened its 54-day live season Friday.
The tradition began with Eric and Ceci's grandfather, T.H. Jackson, who began distributing the Form shortly after Oaklawn began racing in 1904.
The mantle was passed to Raymond Jackson in the early 1950s and continues today through his daughter, Ceci Clay, and his granddaughter, Abigail Clay.
Even Eric Jackson, Oaklawn's general manager since 1978, has had his hands in the family business.
"It's a neat story," Ceci Clay said. "I'm proud of what Eric has accomplished, tickled to death I got to do something I really enjoy doing and I'm tickled to death even more that Abby likes it."
Ceci Clay, 55, began working for her father in 1978 and has held distribution rights to the Form since he died in 1993.
Clay's company, All States News, acts as a clearinghouse for the distribution of the Form, which is vital to handicappers since it contains past performances, or running lines, for each horse entered to run.
"If the racing forms are late, you would think it's the end of the world," Clay said.
Unlike the days when Raymond Jackson had to drive to Little Rock or Memphis to pick up the Form, it now arrives at All States News on a truck from Dallas.
Since May, Clay said editions that will contain past performances for Oaklawn's 2009 live season have been printed by The Dallas Morning News.
Once the Form arrives at AllStates News, just off Central Avenue about three-quarters of a mile north of Oaklawn, two of Clay's trucks run distribution routes throughout Garland County, Clay said.
Clay said the number of delivery sites is fluid, but could be as many 35.
The amount delivered to convenience stores, liquor stores, gas stations, etc., varies, Clay said,depending on sales.
Most copies of the Form, naturally, are designated for Oaklawn.
Clay guessed roughly 2,000 were available Friday. She said the total grows to roughly 5,500 for Arkansas Derby Day, which traditionally draws Oaklawn's largest crowd of the season.
Normally, Clay said she receives her copies no later than 11 a.m. (editions that also carry past performance for the next day of racing) and sometimes as early as 8 a.m.
"The earlier we get them, the better," Clay said. "Has to be that way."
Clay was referring to "blow offs" - material related to the following day of racing "being sold today."
"We used to get through at 3 p.m., pack up and go home," Clay said. "Now you've got night racing and all that."
At Oaklawn, the Form is sold at stands adjacent to the south entrance, north entranceand in Clay's cramped office behind the reserved seating department.
Clay, who receives a set fee for each copy sold, is responsible for ordering the amount sold at Oaklawn.
The job can sometimes be tricky, Clay said, because tracks across the country now draw entries 48 to 96 hours before race day.
For example, Clay had until noon Friday to order copies of the Form for Oaklawn's Jan. 23 racing card.
But if Oaklawn's Classix - a wager that requires bettors to select the winners of races 3-8 - isn't hit over the weekend, Clay may place an 11th-hour call to the Form's corporate office in Lexington, Ky., to ask for maybe an additional 150 or 200 copies for next Friday.
The request, Clay said, would be based on an expected surge in fan interest generated by a robustcarryover.
"It's just a roll of the dice," Clay said. "It takes around $200,000 to get people's attention, and that happens so rarely."
Clay said she can't recall running out of copies during the past five or six years.
She said her goal is to keep returns under 15 percent, much lower than the figure the Form asks of its distributors.
Copies not sold are now recycled locally.
"It's a little niche business," said Eric Jackson, 58. "It's a heck of a lot easier now, and I know my little sister probably won't agree with that. But it was tough when my dad did it back in the '50s and '60s. That drive to Memphis was a killer drive."
In that era, Oaklawn's 24-hour entry rule meant fans normally wouldn't see past performances until race day.
"It was a full-tilt panic when the forms weren't there."
Jackson said a fond memory as a wide-eyed 7-year-old was riding shotgun each Saturday with Chester Jones to deliver copies of the Form out of Raymond Jackson's panel truck throughout Hot Springs and pick up returns from the previous week.
Jones, who still delivers copies, was Raymond Jackson's only employee.
Clay has six full-time workers, including her daughter, Abigail, who began selling copies at Oaklawn at 15 and now, a decade later, is side-by-side with her mother in the trenches.
Abigail Clay, 26, apparently was destined to continue the family tradition.
Ceci Clay said she was showing off her youngest daughter at Oaklawn just six hours after she was born.
"She loves it," Clay said. "You either love this business or you hate it."
Obviously, the Jackson family loves it.
Sports, Pages 27 on 01/17/2009