Reaching Out : Hubbard Brings Hands-On Style to Hollywood Park

R.D. Hubbard, with a lipstick-creased face and a very tired hand, was making a tour of the Directors’ Room at Hollywood Park when a stockholder approached him.

“Mr. Hubbard, I’m Mabel Harris and I bet three friends at my table that you would come over and say hello to them,” she said.

Never, in the history of Hollywood Park, was there a safer bet.

Hubbard, like a politician in an election year, was at work. By unofficial estimate, he shook hands with more than 500 people by the sixth race. He spent less time in the Directors’ Room than any director on the grounds.

Wednesday was the coronation of the new boss at Hollywood Park, and he wanted to know what the average bettor was thinking about his remodeled facility.

Apparently, there was considerable curiosity. The on-track attendance was 37,862, larger than any day at Hollywood Park last year. The attendance was up more than 107% over last year’s opening, and it was the ninth-largest opening day in the track’s history. You have to go back to 1947, when Hubbard was 11, to find the record of 44,487.

“Secretly, I was really hoping for between 28,000 and 30,000,” Hubbard said at the conclusion of a long day. “We prepared for between 30,000 and 32,000. This was incredible.”

Hubbard gained control of the track early this year after a bitter proxy fight. Ousted was Marje Everett, the matriarch of Southern California racing for many years. Everett was concerned about the bettors, but her management style, the buying of Los Alamitos and the building of the Cary Grant Pavilion cost her the favor of Hollywood Park stockholders.

Hubbard also is stressing the needs of the bettor. He allowed a Times reporter to follow him all day under one condition. “Please don’t write about the stars in the Directors’ Room,” Hubbard said. “That’s not the image I want this track to project.”

But Hubbard has an established image in the minds of many. By late afternoon, his office had been sent eight arrangements, a case of his favorite Scotch and bottles of champagne. Combine that with a handful of faxes, and Hubbard was suddenly the darling of California racing.

Hubbard’s most important day in racing started at 6 a.m. He was at the track by 7:15 and did a radio interview at 7:30. Then he slipped back to his Kansas and Texas background.

He took his horse, Mr. Paint, out for an hour’s ride along the backstretch at Hollywood Park. Mr. Paint, who normally lives in New Mexico at Hubbard’s Ruidoso Downs track, was vanned to Los Angeles for this meeting.

At 9 a.m., Hubbard changed into his city duds and visited the early bird betting area to ask the opinions of those that show up early.

“They gave me a lot of good suggestions,” he said. “And we’re going to implement them right away.”

From there, it was off to a 10 a.m. board meeting of both the Hollywood Park Operating Co. and the Hollywood Park Realty Co. They decided to send to the shareholders a proposal to discontinue making them separate stocks, which he said would be a better deal for the shareholders.

At 12:20 p.m., Hubbard addressed the crowd from the winner’s circle. He had prepared remarks but didn’t use them. He asked the assembled to let him know their complaints.

“I bet I get 1,000 letters,” Hubbard said later.

After a rousing rendition of the national anthem by an Inglewood woman, he started to find out what the betting public thought. Incredibly, there was spontaneous applause from patrons as he walked by although one person snarled at him, “Why did you have to jazz up the national anthem?”

In the grandstand area, he became an anonymous face with a celebrity name.

“Hi, I’m R.D. Hubbard,” he would say, thrusting his hand forward. “What do you think of the place?”

In most cases, the verbiage would be followed by great surprise. Everyone knew the name, but few knew the face.

The litany of praise was great. A sampling included:

--”You work miracles.”

--”Bless your heart.”

--”This is great.”

--”You’ve done a wonderful job.”

And on and on.

And, of course, about every fifth person would have advice, as only hard-core horse players could give.

A man from New York criticized the food service. Hubbard told him he’d take care of it.

One man in the grandstand said there needed to be more garbage cans. Hubbard told him he’d take care of it.

Another fan offered him a bottle of beer he smuggled in. Hubbard said it wasn’t his brand. The fan said next time, he’d take care of it.

Hubbard played the public relations game perfectly. He overheard one patron talking about a mix-up on a meal and told the meal captain to comp it. He saw a long line at the mutuel windows by the saddling area and tried to get more windows open.

And, he gave one woman, whose deceased husband was one of the first directors, a director’s pin that was a replica of one of the first. She cried.

“Today was a big surprise for all of us,” Hubbard said at the end of the day. “The best part was that everybody was having fun. They were smiling. The main thing is to get people to come here and then tell their friends. Today was as close to a 10 as you can get.”

There were few negatives to Hubbard’s first day. There was an admission difficulty at Gate 3, which he promises to solve by the weekend. And the feature race had only three horses because of two late scratches.

It put a dent in the mutuel handle, which was $4,806,083 on-track with an additional $1,299,410 off-track. Even so, the total was up about 25% over last year.

“It’s not the off-track that I’m concerned about,” Hubbard said. “I want people to come back to Hollywood Park. I want this to be the land of lakes and flowers. I want it to be what it once was.”

Reconstructing the day, there was one place that Hubbard didn’t visit. It was the back of the Directors’ Room.

For Hubbard, that fits into the attitude of the new Hollywood Park.