The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 469 - The Ringer

Episode Date: February 23, 2021

Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds examine horse expert Peter Christian Barrie.Sources Tour DatesRedbubble Merch

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American History podcast where each week I Dave Anthony read a story from American history to my friend. Gareth Reynolds who has no idea what the topic is going to be about. So you did buy American because you feel a divide in this country. Are you sort of is that your way of sort of are you sending out a signal to people Dave? I want yeah I want people to come together I think we need more love. I agree. Yep and we are starting a new group called hugs across America. Hugs and drugs. Hugs and drugs across America and our idea is that you we're gonna start a big line and everyone's gonna hug someone else and

it's gonna go all the way around America and at the same time people are gonna pass whatever drugs they have and when the when the hugs get all the way to the ocean the beach in California. Gareth and I will be there to hug the final person and then take all of the drugs. Yep yep that'll be the end of it. That's that's the whole idea. It's a weird charity. It's a charity by the way. It's a charity yeah it's a 501C I think. I should probably tell my little story I want to tell you after the ads. Okay well then let's do the ads or no we're gonna do the music. We'll do the music and then you'll tell your story after

the ads that's right. Okay great. Or you can tell your story before the ads. Okay great. Okay music now and called it quote his jam patch. Jam patch. I'm the fucking hippo guy. My name's Gary. My name's Gary. Wait is it for fun? And this is not gonna become a tickly podcast. Okay. This is like an adult five-part coefficient. Now hit him with a puppy. You both present sick arguments. No sleep though hippo. That's like that hippo. Actually partner. Hi Gary. No. I sleep done my friend. No. No. Ronda. Ronda in the car. Wow that was so good. Yeah it really was. What a jam. So my mother was I'll

make this quick. My mother was watching this quiz show and she said this clue came up about this guy named Frank. Last name begins on L. I can't remember. She's like and essentially what he did is at an Olympic event he his manager like he got in his manager's car and his manager like drove him half of the race and he won the gold and then like two days later they took the gold away from him because people were like hey that guy was actually in a car for a lot of the years and I go I go oh wow I go that's amazing I go what's his name and I Google him and it's you know there and I I bing him sorry but I don't use Google

I bing and and I go oh yeah okay all right and then I and then I'm doing a little more research then I see it says 1904 Olympics the one took place and the wildest Olympic games ever and I go oh okay great now guys are any books on it I order a book and then as I'm talking to my mother I'm going you know this this sounds really familiar and she does it and I go hold on and then I bing the dollop and 1904 Olympics and sure enough it's the Rory Scoville episode but the best part and unfortunately this maybe I'll post this picture but the book I ordered Dave is totally for a child it is a book and it even says what does it

say it says on here somewhere like the age range is offensive for me I mean it's on Simon and Schuster dot com slash kids is where you buy it should have been a flag oh my god I should I should be reading kids history books to you I mean well I will say when it got here I was like well I'm glad I didn't invest too much in this you know and then this big like encyclopedia from the event whoa what just happened to you it turned on a light it's got so bright anyway I thought that was pretty funny the book I don't know I was like oh this is for a six-year-old child great good good work really around really good Gareth episode you've

already done you ordered the book for toddlers the learning to read book that's better let's enjoyable story thank you a little a little fun I think a lot of people are probably concerned about you but yeah yeah yeah no my mother didn't find that to be awesome February 14th 1888 what wait that's so weird because it's like Valentine's Day and it's kind of like a heart it's like oh my god I'm already loving this one damn it's a Valentine's special hold on let me before you jump in let me just say to everyone if you are listening with a loved one grab their hand because this is the this is the very special dollop

Valentine's episode Peter Christian Barry was born in Edinburgh Scotland so we have a Scottish accent gentlemen the bloody odds of this his father was a butcher that's right not much is known about childhood in 1914 at the age of 26 he emigrated to house so we cut 26 cut straight through it there's too much going on in the rest of the story is but we know study but there is stuff known before 26 it's not really like yeah he wrote about it but no one believes what he said what a great what a great preview okay all right 26 he goes to Australia like you know man boy we're shipping you off to the penal colony

country go get on the ship you're off he was like I worked at a I worked at a I studied at a veterinary place and everyone's like no you didn't so it's that kind of stuff okay all right so he goes to Australia now that year he went in Susie got there he enlisted in the sixth light horse regiment and he told them that he was a veterinary dentist and had worked for three years caring for horses in the Royal Fleet auxiliary in in the UK but he didn't that's not something so we have a Scottish lying horse dentist that's correct ideal specifically in the teeth of the people humans teeth are far too bloody tiny I

kind of get in there the horse teeth are big the chompers simple author David Ashford is where most of this comes from quote just under 511 inches tall 166 pounds with a with a dark red cheeks hazel eyes and black hair his cheeks sound bruised yeah the cheeks the cheeks kind of what do you think of my lovely natural rouge looks like he's been hit with a tack hammer in the sides of his face look at that hey I'm dead sexy look at that hey lovely Peter was sent to a Gallipoli to fight obviously that did not go well for the Australians Peter said his right

arm was seriously wounded after fighting it's like four months and then he was discharged but he was actually there for two months and he got a septic foot so he said he fought four months and got discharged he actually served two months because his foot got all gross yeah he had what they he had what we call gross foot in he had what we call yuck heel he he healed up on a hospital ship for a month and then he was sent back to the front but he was only back there for a day because then he got terrible terrible diarrhea and he was sent to England on a hospital ship Christ I'll tell you what I'm shitting so much I might need to

go back to the UK I've got this shit so bad I've got to go home I know it's a ball right but it's it's they know how to handle the shit there now they've never seen Scottish diarrhea it's absolutely it's like a bloody fire hoes oh Christ almighty shit I thought my fucking foot hurt oh Christ God I'll tell you what why don't you just have me bite the back of the vessel and then I'll just die your ass across the bloody ocean back home be like a rocket booster oh golly I'm hollow I've got nothing left to give I just crapped it a piece of paper that said I owe you feces so he's in a hospital in in England

for a bit and on he's let out on September 14th and then he went and worked at the Australian Army headquarters in Westminster as a driver for a little bit and then in March the medical board discharged Peter from the army due to a shortness of breath yeah well I can't believe he was hanging like it's I mean as they're really they really want you back out there on the front lines they're really willing to repair you he really seems like he did not want to be in the army yeah so a lot of that is just kind of inflated stuff you think or you think you all that's all that stuff is real he told other

stories he was like I got hurt in the arm blah blah but that's all the true part right okay right but his stories are different I was given other men diarrhea so they yeah I have came up with a spell I didn't use anything that he said I used what other people okay he got into crime he served two months for stealing a wallet and then he met and married Florence Eva Vince she was 23 he's about 29 I think and they moved into the Queen's Hotel in Leicester Square and then I started buying horses and pretty soon had eight horses stabled at the Epson Racing Yard wow that's a lot that's a lot of horses it

is a lot of horses now Britain at this time it's post World War one their flush crowds are packing into racetracks and going to other gambling places okay now ringing ring a ringer when you ring it's when you take two horses one slow and one fast and you enter the slow horse in a race and then it doesn't do that well and then you change the appearance of a fast horse to look like the slow horse and you put him in another race as whatever one thinks is a slow horse right and then that horse wins that's the ringer low expectation right yes okay so you create a loser only to hide your winner right

you create a loser that will have really long odds and then that horse wins you make a lot of money right so you clean up now the jockey club is a body that oversaw horse racing right there a tiny body but still yes a tiny large body it's a it's a large group of tiny bodies right yep so doping horses was actually not illegal until 1903 up until then you get just dope away sure great and then even after 1903 they made it illegal but there's no one to enforce the rule good right very similar to how we are handing the Paris Climate Accord that's correct and then up until 1913 horses raced without names so you could

really commentators job big back he's out front and then there's another brand one behind him he's a little more brown and the one who's a little less brown than that what's going up in front of him right now but there's a black one behind him who's not as black as the one who was in front but he's still a black horse and he's moving closer we got a white horse with a couple dots without behind him behind the one that's brown but not as brown but the white horses still by a hide with spots but the brown one is not as bright as the other one but still brown he's one of the three brown ones he's moving up a little closer

one of the black horses coming from the hide the white horse is making a move White horse respond make it move behind the brown horse now. He's near the brown horse It's not as brown as the other brown horse up near the first black horse Now he's taking the lead white horse response. I'm gonna take it away from the black horse white horse response Hey, I want to collect my winnings. I am 20% certain my horse won We have no real way of figuring it out here is your money

Thank you. Yes, that's how this works by the way. We're shutting Yeah, well, I think here's my I we were taught I was talking to my friend Frank over here Frank has a name and that's so I don't call him. Hey white guy So I was thinking that's a great idea. Yeah, what's your name? Frank would just name them all Frank. No, no, and we got Frank going ahead now He's got Frank there Frank's another one of those another Frank behind him third Frank who nobody saw coming for Frank Frank's in the lead Frank's moving it so

That's how that works Up until 1920 owners could use ali's so you could be like I would like to race my horse My name is Frank Frank and they would be like, yeah, cool. All right, Frank Frank. There's no rules so we so there's there's no rules and Your you could be named whatever you want to be named I just love that. There's no rules and people are betting on it. It's just like Sounds tough So in 1918 Peter Berry met Gilbert Marsh who was a con man and Peter bought a horse from him for $400

but then when Mars tried to cash the check the check bounced and He Tried to get the horse back, but the horse was already on a ship headed for Ireland So Marsh confronts Peter and then Peter says look I bought that horse for a client. So that check That client screwed both of us And they so where's the client? He said oh the client got killed when the German submarine sunk his ship in the Irish Channel Yep, yeah, and he was like well well as long as we both got screwed by this guy who's dead from a German sub

So this How however it happened maybe Marsh thought that was an amazing lie because they started working together Okay Now Peter had a three-year-old Philly named Mexican Bell and a two-year-old horse that had never raced Okay, so he the two-year-old was then entered in two races two days apart and Peter died Mexican Bell from beta brown Bay is like a reddish color from beta brown and And when he was done Mexican Bell looked exactly like the two-year-old

Okay And it had to look like the two-year-old because Mexican Bell's X trainer was going to be out the track watching the race right, okay So usually Usually you had two horses because you would run the slower horse in the first race and then the quicker So is everybody just playing the ringer game? I don't think everybody is but it seems like a lot of people could be yeah Okay, I think that the main thing here is is making the horse look like the other one Which is actually where the artistry and skill comes in

So in many ways, this is a makeover competition. Yes very much. Okay. All right So usually you'd use the two horses the slow and the fast one But Peter wasn't really sure about the two-year-old like it had never run maybe to run too. Well So instead he ran Mexican Bell in the first race and just doped her with a lot of them Just lower down horses, right That's good now barely make it now that's a good pony barely make it now Sure enough she finished last and then Peter gave The second race gave Mexican Bell cocaine

With a syringe 30 minutes before the race wait is Mexican Bell the one he ran in the that's the one he ran in the first Race too. Yeah for some reason he didn't trust going he didn't trust the bad horse and so he doped so he's uppers and downs like Belushi-ing the horse Now Marsha's job was to make the bats But Peter wasn't as experienced as giving horses cocaine as he was at giving them a lot of them Come on snort it take a lump. Take a bump. Have a baby bump. Come on. It'll be great

You'll have be able to have more whiskey after the beat. He's the Scottish one, right? Yeah So he gave he gave he gave a Mexican Bell too much cocaine. So she's chewin gums. She's chewing on the reins. Oh, yeah Yeah, you know one time when I was a little baby horse when I came out and my legs were all wobbly as a little baby horse Do you have any lot of this? Have it lot of I had a lot of earlier, but what is the baby horse and I was running around So she she chews her reins so much that at the start of the race Mexican Bell breaks out of the reins and She runs completely out of the kind of control comes in last and then has to be chased down which and the guy who chased her down would actually turn out to be your ex trainer who didn't recognize her and

They lost all their money, but Peter was still proud that the trainer didn't recognize her. So When look look we've got to find our small little baby victories inside of this and we died the horse properly Right before the horse died. Yeah from a drug overdose All right Yeah, it's not great No No, but it is also great in a way. So and The good news is I finally have learned how to properly cocaine a horse have lost on me fucking money

Well, look, it's can I be the one who's you know responsible look it makes a compels the enemy and all this she fuck this He gave her 19 pounds of cocaine 19 pounds. She kept snorting the bloody stuff. What was that to do? I don't know how to tell a horse head out. She's a fucking horse Well, the mistake I did was property in all the feedback. That was the foolish move Just giving our feedback full of Yale Christ will make I don't know what I was expecting But again, I don't I do not feel like the bad guy here. I feel like you know Only one of us has a prepared a pretend background in equine dentistry

So let's have some respect for the fake doctor amongst us. Yeah, all right. Thank you So Peter immediately sets up his next score using an alias For himself. He enters a horse named a coat of mail in Stockton in a race for two year olds for Two year olds who have never run a one a race. So it's like okay, not that good horses So coat of mail is a terrible and the guy and finishes terribly and then a guy named Walter Hopkins buys the horse right after the race

So Hopkins turns out to be working with Peter and he's already bought a horse named jazz for eight hundred dollars and Peter isn't even at the race. He is picked up jazz and he has her in a train car or him Has him in a train car and as the train is you know going up towards Stockton He's painting the horse in the train in the boxcar I mean So now jazz looks like I like to picture him like how like when Bugs Bunny would paint He just gets a beret and the little like palette with the brush, you know, he's doing it like that He's just in character

Okay, so yeah, sure, sir. I mean and how quickly David does paint dry upon a horse's flesh It's it's I mean it they used different things use henna and dye and like it's a process like it takes a while to do It seems like I would imagine yeah paint a horse is then undertaking. Yeah so So he gets there as usual Marsh does the bedding and they're due to win 40k if this all works out with the with the odds and everything They should win 40k Okay, and Kota male wins

But Marshall had not just bet He owed a lot of bookies So he told all the bookies about the ringer and pretty soon everyone knew Peter said it became such an open secret that quote whenever I walked down Coventry Street I was certain to meet a half dozen people who would pull me up a finger my jacket and say that's a nice Kota male You've got on but you've had it died That that's the kind of lying that he does That's why I didn't know you know you're I mean he's horse famous

Hard to achieve horse notoriety and that's amazing. Yeah, the overt nature It's such a clear lie and it's so funny that he he like no one knows who he is But in his lie like everyone knows him as the horse guy even though no one knows he owns the horse like it's there's that Scottish horse liar So anyway, what happens is is all these people bet on the horse the odds plummet and instead of instead of winning 40,000 she holds the pony who take it the hose on it. We're gonna it'll be she's not gonna bloody hell I'm trying to think of the plan now They end up winning 167 pounds That's not enough to cover the bloody paint

Peter bought a fur coat and cashed his check with the guy who sold the fur coat. Oh my god so but what happened was because of all the suspicious betting the Jockey Club starts looking into it and Peter just keeps going he starts another another horse con and he keeps winning races and he keeps running the ringer scam Peter and Hopkins also made money selling shitty horses to racers in India. So So code of mail is the name of the is the name of the shitty horse. So now people think the shitty horse won So he made the shitty horses valuable and then he would sell them but he'd sell it to people in India where there's racing going on Because that's so far away that it's not gonna get him a little shit. Yeah, it's like yeah, you're shipping lemon horses So yeah, and the people there wouldn't find out the horse was bad until they got to India until they were like, well, what are we gonna do?

We're gonna go to Australia and find this English the Scottish lunatic So Peter's possibly the best horse painter in the world Well, what did what so his I mean is that it's a skill Give the man Give the artists just do you know, I used to want to be a pretend dentist But now I've realized my bloody colon is actually painting ponies I'm a pony painter So his fingernails are almost completely gone from all the bleach and ammonia he rubbed into horse hides

Oh my god, what about their hides that's to make white spots Oh my god, so he's just but I mean You know what can I just at least say this it's nice that he's also damaging his flesh Yeah, it's not like he's like, you know got a sponge. He's just putting his Raw paw in buckets of ammonia bloody hell that burns great soul mighty He's an artist. He's not gonna use a sponge Yeah How dare I he used silver nitrate to cut off white spots

He used silver nitrate to color the noses and Hanna for the hair He used a rubber stamp for dappled white spots This is insane He removed tail hairs and he changed mains Since these were three-year-olds running as two-year-olds He had to deal with the teeth and he used a knife and drill on the teeth He he said these were all skill the teeth skills he learned in the army

Sure, right when he was shitting So I mean it sounds like he pretty I mean this like he should have It sounds like he could have a makeover show like a horse renovation show Oh, yeah You could have a show on HD you could have a horse and garden television It's like welcome to flip this pony today. We've got a five-year-old stallion But we're gonna turn it into a one-year-old pony This is not gonna be easy. Well first thing I'm gonna do is I've got to knock out a few of these bloody teeth

Then you want to get your hand in the bucket a bleach really dip your hand in there as you can see from my hands They look like angel wings without fingernails Last night I watched five consecutive shows about turning Shipping containers into houses Yeah, that's there are some moves like that right now where I'm like, uh, yes, please Have you seen have you seen the house that like flips into It like builds itself in 10 minutes. It's the craziest. I don't think that's real Is this a children's book story?

Yeah, it's in my book about the Olympics Yeah, it's in my book about the Olympics Okay, I'll have to look that up house that builds itself. Yep build house self. Yep, you'll find it So I mean the big problem with this is Tons of people betting on unknown horses all of a sudden all these people are betting on this horse and that will always raise suspicion So that's always drawing the attention of the jockey club and on June 5th 1920 Peter was arrested and charged with getting a check for 167 pounds under false pretenses So they figured out how he was from that that race

They've arrested him Hopkins is also arrested Now Peter gets out on bail and then he gets arrested again A month later this time for conspiracy This is on based on another horse race So he he should give himself like the horse treatment. He should like change his skin tone a little bit fix his teeth Yeah I patch or something. He said if he's so skilled paint yourself. Yeah Four other people were arrested

Okay, Marsh was not arrested. So Peter would let her say quote I could tell for I know very nearly the amount of money that Marsh paid to keep out of the boob Well a couple of things there's a lot. Yeah, I do you want to start to how to you know more than I do I even need to ask my questions? Do you just want to ask them an answer them? Well, who wants to stay out of the boob? Yeah, I mean I guess out of the boob Out of the boob. It's not like oh man. I got in her boob. What I was in her boob So maybe it's not something you want, but so the slammer's the boob. Yeah, slammer's the boob Okay, and so he he bribed a cop. That's it. Marsh did he bribed a cop? Okay, so they were coming for him

He gave a cop money and then he stayed out of the boob. Yeah that Boston. He's not anywhere near inside the boob So Peter get in the boob you bastard You're just as bad as we are and we're locked in this booby Peter pleaded guilty Everyone else the other five went to trial so because he pleaded guilty they all blamed him and said that he had duped them And on the Hopkins on the stand Hopkins said it was quote a disgraceful fraud to run a three-year-old That's a two-year-old so all these guys are like I can't believe he did this In all my years I've never been so disgusted with the behavior of someone

It's a repulsive And does anyone actually know how to get ammonia off of flesh? I'm covered in it Hello Governor, I do Oh, hello. That's a good idea. He suggests we put aloe on it Called us governors he did Yes, have me some of that aloe. Oh, hello Governor. That's lovely on it Really does do everything. Quite a miracle liquid, isn't it? Hopkins was found guilty. He got 15 months. The only guy of the five who was innocent was found guilty and got 15 months

Because the judge refused to believe anybody could be that stupid and thought he had to have been a part of that Wow really happy you're like exactly exactly Peter ended up getting three years The Times wrote quote it is part of the national honor of England that one of the greatest of her sports should be conducted with clean hands Now it's the fucking dirtiest sport in England. I mean we already went to earlier all the shit that was going on Yeah, the sport with nobody has a name that one One where you literally get to just go there and create a character for yourself It's hard to believe that that wasn't on the up and up

All right, I'm gonna go to the track and who are you gonna be I'm gonna be a Catholic gymnast I mean at this point the jockey club is is accepting horses that there's barely any proof the real I mean it's still just you know This this is just two guys in a horse costume they'll race once we come up enough they'll race so Peter did his time in Dartmoor prison and He got out his wife had a baby five months after he got out and now I don't know if you're a big math guy Love numbers. Yeah, so the human calculator. So that doesn't work as far as him putting the baby stuff in the baby making Well, uh It depends

How slow is his jizz It's pretty slow Yeah, maybe he's got maybe but maybe no, maybe Dave, maybe he painted some of his semen to look like other I'll get there. I'll get there. Yeah. Yeah So on the birth certificate the father's name was just a dash Uh-huh. That's right Dash not dad dash at this point for some reason the wife drops out of the story. She's not around anymore Interesting seemed like everything was going pretty well at home

Peter then got wait. She probably invented a spice and this is the story. Mrs. Dash. Go ahead. That's right Peter obviously Peter then got one of the most popular writers of the day Edgar Wallace to ghostwrite his confession. So he's at a prison. He's like I need a way to make money I can sell my story right Wallace was a huge horse racing guy But a friend said quote he thought he knew everything about racing. I never met a man who knew less So Wallace all bet he lost he always lost that was his thing In the time when you're not even really betting in many ways he can't win. Okay

So Peter set up a horse race tip business And Wallace ended up taking it over I don't know how that happened, but I assume he sold Wallace The business a stupid business. Yeah, it didn't last long tip line. Yeah, it's like what well It's Wallace. So he's literally giving the worst tips to everybody. So it folds within six months Oh, he gives the tips. Yeah, the guy. No, you're oh, I thought people are calling it like it's crime tips That four-year-old pony's actually two don't ask who told you No, he people call him up for horse for racing tips betting tips

And he gives them so Wallace takes over he's terrible the business folds A key component in your horse tip business is having accurate information and insight into what horses will do It helps now The reason he was able to open a tip business the first place was because Peter had his confession His confession is printed in John Bull magazine What magazine John Bull magazine? I think John Bull is like their What's our guy's name John Deere. No, like our Uncle Sam type guy. I think that is John Bull

I think it is This is the headline quote for the first time in turf history the vile which has hidden the modern methods of rascality Practiced by the unscrupulous underworld of the turf is torn aside Wow How long do you think they spent on that sentence? Hours? I mean it's hard to tell or if like it was said the first time he's like that's perfect it's catchy and it makes perfect sense Just go here and as a headline could possibly be get it in the paper and get it in the paper fast

So Peter Peter promises all of the racetrack cons he had been a part of and it's a 15 article series Okay After Peter declares quote with me ringing is a thing of the past my mind is made up never again But he has no skills I mean it's not like he can get into circus horse painting like it's Sure Right There's no job Yeah he's horse Casso

He did and then there's a depression happening also so he has a record on top of that so he's just unemployable Bad yeah So he decides to leave the country and he takes a ship to Canada He on the ship he dressed up like a priest and was so convincing the captain asked him to preach the ship sermon on a Sunday Oh my god is there a bittersweet brothers and sisters take hand in hand and put your maybe also put your hands together Maybe don't hold hands that was a strange thing for me to say I've done this many times before The Lord has seen over this lovely vessel for quite a time and I think it's about time we paid the piper as it were And let the Lord know how great we think he is and he is male heads down please

Oh sweet father you are so great some of the waters were rough but for the most part you didn't make the, you didn't anger the sea on our behalf And we cannae tell you how much we appreciate it You are so good based on the Bible a book that is filled with stories about your brothers and potentially your sister maybe not but Might be probably gets into your mum a bit as well your dad was able to get your mum pregnant without actually putting it inside her And that's actually quite magical I don't think you are alright And the idea of being able to have a child far after ejaculate or not ejaculate is too foreign to me Wrap it up wrap it up that's it

My wife got pregnant when I was in the boob for three years I came out and she had a five month old And I tell you the Lord works in mysterious ways You are a priest Right oh yeah of course I am, yeah I am animal horse dentist but I am mainly a priest right And when I say wife I don't mean wife what I mean is life and by boob I mean boob and by baby I mean Jesus So the story I've just told you is actually one about Mary and Jonathan and the baby Jesus It's not, it's not at all, it's not at all

It's the same, yeah so It's not, it's not at all I'm saying that he's looking over us and it makes total sense You're worried Let's sing a hymn Let's all have a quick hymn, he is great, he's our Lord and he's up there for sure He's doing things in mysterious ways We don't know but he risks one of those days

He's the Lord, alright, thank you everybody I'll be in the poop dick, thank you You see, you're fucking shit but great Ainda You really went out big Yeah, I'm him, I'm just as another guy complimenting myself So he arrives in Canada in 1923 and then he just immediately pays a bribe to get across the border and he made his way to New York City Okay Now there he got a job working as a horse groom with a top horse

A horse groom? I do Top horse groom And I do again Gives him a great feeling when they feel like they're married So he's working for a top horse owner on the east coast, Sam Hildreth And after a bit he became Hildreth's chauffeur Oh, chauffeur I'll take it

Ari chauffeur He became a Hildreth's chauffeur and Peter soon came to know a group name, it was the purple gang Who were these violent bootleggers out of Detroit Okay So again, like we said, doping horse is very common And he's falling in with a good crowd, it sounds like He's really, he is turning over a new leaf That's right

The tracks basically condone the doping Peter, quote, the sixth or seventh events in almost any track are known as drugstore races It's sort of how like SNL puts on the weirder sketches late So the purple gang asked Peter to find out what drugs Hildreth used on his horses So they're just assuming everyone drugs because they do Right So Peter, Peter took three of the bottles that were used to drug the horses out of the car's glove compartment And they had it analyzed and it was heroin and cocaine

I just cannot believe, it's just crazy They're just pigotting these horses full of these drugs I've never, why would you, I've never understood why you would do heroin and cocaine at the same time Well, I think a speedball is a mix and I mean I don't know Yeah, it is It's supposed to be great, but I mean, it sounds like there's a tremendous downside I'm sure at first you're like, oh, okay, yeah But yeah, I mean the hair, I guess it's just, it's super fucked up is what it is

I mean it's just obviously crazy So Peter would tell the purple gang which of Hildreth's horses to bet on I can't believe the purple, I mean at some point I do have to mention it is a very bizarre name I thought I'd hear it once and I'd be like, I could leave it But now it's like, the purple gang's a big player in here, I'm just picturing like the Wiggles So he would tell the purple gang which of Hildreth's horses to bet on Because he knew all the scams they were doing, he was helping with the scams I mean there was stuff like they're using electric buzzers and just all kinds of nonsense

Sure, yeah, let them know you're gonna coke them up heroin and cocaine and give them the inside track In 1926 he and Hildreth had a parting of the ways So Peter's on his own and he ran a scam in Canada and was arrested But instead of going to court, he changed his name to Patrick Christie and moved to Chicago They always say, do you plead innocent, guilty, not guilty, no contest Or would you like to change your name to Patrick something or other and move to Chicago? So he buys two horses Calicoa for $2,500 and Bobby Dean for $100,000, so you can probably guess which one's bad

Yeah, Bobby Dean's smoking So he made Calicoa look like Bobby Dean And this is Peter Berry's very first ringer in the US So the purple gang's in on it and they're obviously very dangerous Martin Marx was the leader of the gang and he at one point killed 11 men in 14 days So he's Jesus Not a guy you want to fuck with So you steal a wallet, you go in the boob for three years, 11 guys 14 days, you're still out rigging

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, well you gotta catch them It's a good system So Peter painted Calicoa at the new track outside of Chicago at a new track, sorry And you know the new one I love how you can paint at the track, it's just like Well I don't think it's not open yet, that's what it sounds like, it sounds like it's just been built Or else there's no races happening at that time, they're happening at the other track Because in San Francisco there's two race tracks and they switch

Like they'll run this one for six months and then that one for six months Okay, alright, gotcha So Calicoa is light bay colored and Bobby Dean is dark brown with a little white star on his head So Peter gets to work White star Yeah, two gamblers are lookouts and the gamblers had fronted the money to buy the horses And then they were gonna bet a shitload on it And after some time both horses look the same

And then Bobby Dean is put on a truck and sent to a farm in Ohio And Calicoa goes to Lincoln Fields for the race on Labor Day Now the purple gang and the two gamblers, super excited They rented a room at the Congress Hotel two days before the race So they're doing it classy, they're like treating them like we'll make a weekend out of it That's right I mean, we'll get like the presidential suite with all those some calzones We'll sit up there, we'll make a weekend out of it

You know what I mean, we'll do it right, we'll do it right I mean, they fill up a bathtub with champagne bottles Come on, we got a bunch of champagne, we gotta make it, we gotta make it It's gonna be like a long weekend, okay So yeah, so they're just boozing and having a party for the 250,000 they think they're gonna make off of the race They're very sure they're going to make If you're putting champagne in a bathtub, you are saying the trophy's coming home So Peter wakes up on Labor Day and he realizes there's a really big fucking problem

It had rained for a few days and it's still raining Now Calicoa hates running in the mud, hates it Also paint Yeah, paint, well some of the paint stays on Anyway, Peter Of course Well it takes a little while for it to go away Peter goes to the congress hotel, he goes into the room

It's right about Don and the party is still going on These guys are just like Hey Peter, we're having the best time, man We're just talking about what we're gonna do with some of that extra money we're gonna make You know what we're just thinking? We should get a plane I mean among other horses, cause it's so goddamn rich You said you had to say something, I'm gonna let you go in a second I just wanna tell you how much I love you, baby

Also I assume there's a lot of cocaine But anyway, Peter says call it off cause Calicoa will lose in the mud And one of them told Peter, quote, listen Limey We've put up a lot of dough and come 500 miles to bet on that horse You'd better start him or there'll be trouble Listen to us, you better change reality you hear So You Limey

He doesn't have any choice Yes of course, I'll go find a way to make this horse better in the mud Just give me today Perfect Thank you So it's a huge, huge race There's 30,000 spectators It's the largest racetrack crowd since around 1900

It's a brand new track Governors there, most of the rich Chicagoans are there Tribune called it, said it was like a grand opera opening So Calicoa runs in the second race And the jockey had recently ridden Calicoa in Tijuana But the dye job is so good that he doesn't recognize Calicoa Wow So he is skilled, I mean that's pretty impressive

Calicoa starts well but then slips in the mud So badly the jockey almost falls off but he hangs on And he recovers and he somehow gets Calicoa to finish third Okay So now, if you don't know betting Champagne in that bathtub Yeah, you can bet for a horse to finish first, second, or third Or show, show means they finish in any position in the first three

So the gamblers almost recovered all the money they bet They were just short Okay So it wasn't It's not a catastrophe Yes, they hadn't lost that much So he spared whatever violence could have visited him Right

Right But based on Like, you imagine watching that race as him Oh Christ, oh bloody, like his little Scottish heart Like, oh Christ, oh Christ, oh Christ I would say this is when the gangster started to own him That would be my impression Okay, interesting

So Peter headed to Havana next with his horses and raced for the season there He may have wanted to get the fuck out of, you know, the U.S. after that But Sure During that time Calicoa was barred by stewards for being doped in a race And then another race horse he bought that wasn't very good Named Hot Dog kept winning That's just the worst name

That's terrible Hot Dog Havana season ends, he comes back to the U.S. and he starts traveling around the country Running the ringer con He's using aliases everywhere The sports editor for the New York Daily News at one point Let Peter $80 And a little while after he ran into Peter at a boxing match

And asked Peter how he was doing Peter quote I'm doing a little better now and then he opened his coat To show off $15,000 bills that were pinned to the lining What? What? What is he in the midst of? No, it's not, yeah

Where do you put your money? I put mine in the bank of coat Did you say it $15,000 bills? $15,000 bills Oh fuck, I forgot my coat Oh fuck Oh Christ, you think you give me the wrong jacket miss? Oh no

Oh Christ This one's got fives Oh shit $15,000, I remember the point of having $1,000 bills Can you break a thousand? No Well, I don't think I can have an ale here then That's probably why they stopped making them

So The editor who wrote that story also noted that Peter was controlled by gangsters Quote, for the last three years he has been the tool of gangsters of New York, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and Chicago So in late 1931 he was hanging around Nate Raymond at Duffy's restaurant in New York Raymond may have been the gangster who helped Peter buy the horse Achnaton So for around $5,000 So at the same time he bought Achnaton, he bought two shit horses, Shem and Ep I mean, dude, their name together is Shem, which is the shitty stooge

No, they, it's, yeah Shem? I think the stooges were around Yeah, we didn't even bother to name them This one's Shem This is nothing and turd, the two new horses we've got What's the shittiest horse name you can think of? Crap, this is crap

This is crap, my pony crap Come on, crap Oh, Christ, he's lost again Yeah Perhaps sniffing all the bloody roses Yeah, so it was clearly named after the three stooges because Oh, it was? Well, actually was Shemp in it yet?

Shemp was late Shemp Howard came in, yeah, 1923 Oh, wait Okay Yeah So this was probably, I would imagine this was named after, yeah That's interesting That's a weird thing to name a horse

Yeah, it's not like you're, it's a low bar So Shem had never raced, ever He was just bad, everyone's like he's not going to do anything So Peter uses the alias Peter Wesley and hires a trainer So he creates a new alias to hire a trainer Okay He tells the trainer, the owner of the horse, there's a guy named William Merino And then the trainer meets Merino, Merino knows absolutely fucking nothing about horses

And at the same time he uses Duffy's restaurant address as his own address on forms Are there any red flags about this? So That you'd like to highlight? Uh And so people who are working with him now don't know what's happening At one point they have a driver transporting the horse and Peter was in the trailer painting Shem at the time So they arrive and it's a different colored horse and the driver's like what?

Okay Uh, yeah, never mind Peter quote Considering horse faking is an art, then changing of Ackleton to Shem was a masterpiece I worked on him in the van, I had to change the entire color And put two white legs on him all in this moving van White legs on him Yeah

So that's bleach, yeah, it's crazy So now even the trainer thought Shem was Shem when Shem was actually Actiton So the trainer is now completely fooled Wow So he wins the race, Shem as Actiton as Shem wins the race on October 3rd, 1931 in Maryland The jockey was so surprised by his speed, he said quote, good God, I thought it was on an airplane, what a horse All right, shut up now All right, keep your bloody voice down, it's nothing crazy, just had a good race, that's all it was

But Shem was a Gelding, so that means castrated And Actiton was a Colt Which means balls So Peter I was able to shadow the testicles to make it look like the inside of the horse's thigh May we ask why there are little pieces of chicken Yes Down here

Yes, yes, of course you may The chicken is there as a reward potentially at the end of the race for the horse It's a way to motivate the equine into racing quicker, knowing at the end of the race it will have some genitalized chicken Okay, that makes sense Yes, of course it does, absolutely, you can see everything is on the up and up back here So to make up, to fix the testicle no testicle situation, Peter put ice on Actiton's nuts to retract them All right, there we go All right, we're almost ready, the horse is painted, bleached, I've just got to retract its nuts, then we'll be ready to get out there

All right, I'm just gonna ice the horse's nuts for a minute, just trying to make the testicles go up in the body Yeah, reverse adolescence is the goal Now the Morning Telegraphs writer, John Fitzgerald, thought the win was suspicious, mostly because Nate Raymond was screaming about winning and showing everyone his tickets at the race track Oh boy, it just seems again, like really to get away with stuff just don't brag about it Just shut up Just shut up about it and you'll probably be okay back then So Fitzgerald started looking into Shem and people all over the country, it turns out, had bet huge on Shem Three days after the race, the Morning Telegraph printed a front page story titled, Killing Made on Ringer

With a sub-headline, Shem, not Shem Quote, it's the best, Shem, not Shem Yeah, Shem, not Shem, what the fuck is this paper? Shem, not Shem Quote, there is a strong suspicion that the most important ringing of many years was consummated in this event So racing officials, it turns out, had come to inspect Shem and when they did, Shem was gone He had been loaded into a horse box at 2 a.m. and taken to New York and put in staples owned by a traveling circus Yeah, so it seems like it's a false accusation based on the behavior

So now the power's to be We'd like to see Shem, oh Shem moved to the circus in New York at 2 a.m. last night What are the odds, jeez Shem's a circus horse now Horcus It's a horcus, we call it a horcus And what we've done is we've turned Shem into a horcus Which sounds like a wizard spell, but it's actually when you take your horse and retire it to the circus, it's called a horcus

So, the people who want to clean up, I assume it's owners and other people, they hire the Pinkertons Now, Pinkertons were often used at racetracks, but now they've been hired to take Peter down Finally, some heroes Yeah, Peter arranged for Achniton and Epp to be moved to Indiana And then the head waiter at Duffy's had Shem shipped to Nate Raymond's property in New Jersey I guess Hey, we're committing a crime Just wanted to let everyone know there's some crime happening here real soon, it's about to go down

Crime horse coming through, excuse us, crime horse Hey, this is our horse, crime And then after that, Shem was moved to a converted garage in Highlands, New Jersey It's just like nature It's just dumb mob stuff, it's really something you'd see on Sopranos Yeah, it's like pony fellas So the guy who arranged that move was a bootlegger who had also sometimes managed training camps for pro boxing matches So everyone involved

Yes, it seems, if you've ever touched the side of athleticism, you can have a horse in your garage So rumors started to spread that the ringer Shem was actually Achniton And racing officials would try to track down Achniton and they couldn't The New York Daily News tried to question Shem's owner William Moreno And reported, quote, he could only speak three words of English, I don't know Oh, interesting, so Soon after that story came out, Moreno changed his last name to Martin and shaved off his mustache Alrighty, so there we go, and learned English probably pretty quickly

The Pinkertons then located Shem at the converted garage Wow I mean, they are the horse PD Oh, it's crazy that they did that, and then another Pinkerton found two suspicious horses covered in blankets at the Indiana farm But they couldn't figure out who they were, like I guess they couldn't get the blankets off and figure out Wait, they can't get them off They are really on there Oh, these are weighted blankets? Oh, these horses are so not stressed out

They probably alleviate stress, they probably go to deep REM So the Pinkerton is now just watching the farm, he's keeping an eye on it And after a couple weeks, Peter bribes a local cop to help him get Achniton off the Indiana farm Okay And Achniton is now This episode answers the question, what if horses were drugs? So now Achniton is now being called Sir John and is taken to a different stable Okay

So the Maryland Racing Commission finally, after all this time, I think it's like a month They conclude Achniton has did race as Shem Okay And seven men as well as Achniton, Shem and Amp are all banned for Maryland race tracks The three horses and seven guys who they think are involved I like how you ban the horses, you two, you guys aren't allowed in here either Did a lot of messed up stuff with your denials It is hilarious, it's just the crazy idea, why would you ban the horses? The horses are not

The horses are not going to come back without these assholes who you've banned Remi $30,000, nay Yeah, honestly, yeah And your name? Not John Horse I'm a cat Okay So The officials cannot figure out who Peter is, they don't know of the seven guys

Who's the guy in charge and which one's Peter They did ban Peter Christie Right A week later Peter painted Achniton and raced him as Hickey in Maryland So what's happening essentially, I mean it's like three-card pony But so they are They are trying to, while they're trying to determine just exactly what the hell is going on and who Peter is

Peter is still using these contraband horses and still manipulating appearances and doing what he does Faking names and yeah, doing his thing Right, okay Even at the state that's just banned him, he could go to another state but he just doesn't Right, so he's just like, I mean, he's lazy, he's brash So in that race I can't be fucked to go all the way to fucking Virginia, I'll just stay and get in here and screw it It's like what?

So the gangsters in that race won 200,000 betting Okay, wow So the stewards are super suspicious, so they asked Hickey's previous owner to come down and ID Hickey We want to make sure this is Hickey So the guy Sir, we're here about Hickey, we're wondering if you could come down to the horse track and identify if Hickey's really Hickey or not Well, the only way I could do that is by the Hickeys on the underside did I put that? Well, sir, it's a pick your poison situation we're in here and while what you're doing is certainly not okay, we will take it

So you may come down and try to identify Hickey as long as you stop licking your lips so much Now I'm gonna need to get in there Well, now that's, sir, you said all you need to do is see the Hickeys Ridiculous Well, I go by taste also, I'm really gonna give Hickey a suck Put some more, put some more on there No, that's not, no, that's a simple deal breaker for us, we are looking to have you, you can, we will allow you to look at the underside where you said you What did you just do, why did you moan?

Well, I was just thinking about the taste of my horse Okay, we need your help, but we are not, we are really thinking about not using it because Man, sometimes I thought like, how can I get that taste into a pie? Okay, that's just not acceptable to say to people who don't know you Or people who do No, don't, no, we'll let you put two Hickeys on Hickey, but please help us identify the reality of I'm all count off of seven No sir, absolutely not, that is just, that's not, no, that's just, no

No, what's your problem sir, seven was egregious, that's ludicrous, that is not, we said two Yes, we'll drive Okay I'm gonna need a hotel room with me and the horse Why, why, you live two, there's a three minutes away What are you gonna, why, with, now you understand we can't get Hickey into a hotel With a jet tub You want a hotel with a jet tub and be allowed to give your horse Hickey 17 Hickeys

That's right I just realized we have the wrong address Oh, Christ Oh my Yeah, my indeed So the ex-owner comes and he IDs Hickey right away because they had switched the horses Okay, wow So, I mean, what a shit, this is like David Copperfield level of animal switching

So Peter goes to New York to collect his share of the 200K, but the gangsters tell him it had already been lost in a dice game Quote Hey, it's gone It's a tough break, never mind, Limey, you'll get your money some other time Wow That's crazy Peter never has very much money and this is probably one of the reasons And he's just, he's owned by them, like you said, so there's really little he can do

Wow, that's terrible So Peter starts racing a new horse, Gilmont, that was so slow the previous trainer had said, quote I can throw my hat faster than that horse can run Okay, and is he buying? It's not good, obviously Well, could you get a jockey on your hat, is the next question Do you think it would go faster if you had a jockey on it? And there's the intention to have this, like normally he's buying a couple of horses

Is he buying this horse because he's like, it's a good horse or he's like, this one's garbage No, this one's garbage This is the loser, so Okay You know, so he loses a couple races and then suddenly Gilmont is winning, he wins two races at Agua Caliente in Mexico It's gotta be so funny for someone to approach you and all the bad things about your horse are like making the deal a little sweeter to them You know what I mean, like when you're there like, is she fast? No, she can't move fast at all actually Good, good, good

What about she get injured a lot? Yeah, she's got a real bad injury here, she's got bad back leg too Good, good, good She's smart, stupid as it comes, horse doesn't know nothing, won't even finish the race, gets distracted Perfect, perfect Yep, we'll take her top dollar too Just gotta let this man suck the belly for a little while Hello, I'm Hickey We don't know much about him, we keep him in a bird cage

So at Agua Caliente they were suspicious but he had documentation of who the owner was and all that stuff Sure The Pickerton had completely lost the trail at this point, he kind of dropped off their radar, they had totally fucked up Until Gilmont started racing in back in the US All of a sudden this race in Florida has tons of betting on Gilmont, so the stewards took Gilmont into custody after the race You're under arrest Gilmont had testicles, his teeth were in older horses teeth, he wasn't supposed to have testicles Okay

He looked and seemed exactly like a horse named Shem that had won in Maryland It's impossible though, I merely wanted to see Gilmont with testicles and went to a doctor and had them attached It's as simple as that Overnight his legs started to change color, becoming white And then two men who were familiar with who had trained or whatever own Agniton came And they confirmed that Gilmont was actually Agniton Right, so So the Miami or just Florida bans five horses and three people

One of the people they banned was Willis Cain who was actually Peter Sure But at the time Peter was staying in a Miami hotel under the name of Patrick Williams Sure, okay, so they banned Willis Cain who was Peter who's already come up with another alias and is still in your city That's right Good work, really good So the Pinkerton somehow learned about the alias and they found out that Peter's car was at a mechanics being fixed And so they staked out the mechanics place and after a couple of days Peter came to pick up the car and he was arrested by the Pinkerton

Okay Peter just straight up admitted that he had When he got his car fixed was the mechanic like this Ferrari is actually a Volvo The hell Peter just straight up admitted right away that he painted actors and he's like, yeah, I painted I painted the horse Yeah, so you painted the horse. What's next? The New York Press quote Barry is engaging in a little cuss you cannot help but admire his brazen frankness He's the best con man I ever met

Great So painting horses turns out not illegal in Florida Of course Florida loves that paper straggler The DA in court quote you can't charge a man with painting a horse It's an unusual branch of artistry, but it doesn't appear to be criminal Florida just really consistent So I don't it's I would say it all I don't even know if it's illegal in any states Okay

So It's actually mandated in Florida So they start talking about what they could charge him with in court and someone mentions animal cruelty But then Peter says well he fed them carrots when he was painting them And that works people like oh he gave him carrots while he bleached them. Oh, okay The judge asked Peter what he would give him if Peter was dying his hair and Peter said quote a large scotch and a soda your honor And Peter was released I'm sorry Dave

What were they on the sitcom court? Were they in sit court? Was there a laugh track? And Peter what would you give me if you were dying my hair? What a scotch and a soda your honor I can't stay mad at this guy get out of here Mr. Go paint your ponies It could also been that some of these people didn't think a real crime was being committed because you're you're only ripping off bookies Right

Right so it's like they're all like I think that there's a shady area here that they didn't seem to care that much Sure okay right that kind of makes sense a little bit So right after he was released gets out of court immigration officials start deportation proceedings now it's gonna take 60 days before the case is heard So Peter reacts to his impending deportation the only way he knows how by going on a ringing spree Right So he goes I mean if before he was going at three he's now going at fucking ten Okay And the Pinkerton's are back on his trail

I'm not even gonna go into it because with all the names and it's so confusing over such a short period of time It's gotta be crazy But just imagine a guy who is using he's using different names the trainers are all different names the owners of different names the horses are all different names The horses are being painted I mean I read it four times I was just like this is fucking crit like it's just track after track after track after track Okay State after state name after name horse after horse so the ringing I'm like roughly how many horses are we dealing with

Oh my god there's gotta be like there's gotta be like 15 or horses or so I mean it's a lot Okay And you know you're talking about all the states and the race tracks and the names is really the thing that you're just like I can't do this Right right right it sounds like you're calling a horse race Yeah The rigging spree even confused the investigators Okay

People involved popped up and then they disappeared At one point Canada suspended H. Williams, Peter Christie, E. P. Bell and George Kestering three of those were Peter I love the idea that they're rebelling like he's just making up new names Yeah That's it Well what's he gonna do now He's like my name is Ezekiel Glove They're like good shit

That was easy huh Damn it Despite all this Peter is somehow always broke Part of this probably because like we said the gangsters aren't giving him a share But he's also known to not bet much himself on the races like he would never bet a lot So he's not winning the race I love gambling Give me give me a $2 trifecta

I don't oh gosh I'm just very conservative when it comes to betting I've spent $250,000 on this race but I suppose I just put a five on him So he needs money so Peter now did the same thing he had done in England and he sold his story to the press Okay The New York Daily News quote Herewith begins the most amazing racetrack serial ever printed The story of Patty Berry, Ringer of Horses and Master Horse Faker They won't even have his real name right in the article

I know right So Peter leaves the US three days before the story breaks and he goes to England Wow The Pinkertons are now assured that he's gone They know he got on a ship and left Wait a minute But a month later he goes back into Canada and then sneaks back into the United States Okay, pretty easy

And soon Good work everybody Soon Acta 10 is racing again under other horses He's even going back to his old horses He's not even bothering, he's like I can't quit you Acta 10 you're my baby Papers are reporting on these clear ringer races On December 30th 1933 the New York Press ran a contest called Can You Tell Us Where Achnaton Is

If you could you would win a year's subscription Wait so there I mean that's how desperate Everybody knows it's gone it's so much of the papers like can you find him It's like where's Wally you know Yeah right right right And then at one track Stuart sees Acta 10 The owner Mr. Smithson who was actually Peter vanished So they after a race they knew was Acta 10 instead of the other horse they seized him

He just fucking bails Right A month later two men stole Acta 10 so he's clearly in some sort of stable that the jockey club has I mean the idea this is an irreplaceable horse to them Yeah so two men steal it and give it back to Peter so clearly two gangsters are like we gotta make money There you go repaint it Painter again Peter Peter now going by Mr. Garavan heads for South Carolina

Hello I'm Mr. Garavan Like Garavan but I gotta I mean literally someone was like what's your name in a caravan drove by and he was like Garavan So at this point he's just always on the move he's never slowing down he's just constantly on the move So in August 1934 he has a falling out with a gambler that he went in on a horse with So Peter has a woman possibly his wife he got married again to some like crazy hot Irish woman She's supposed to be like okay insanely gorgeous and It sounds like she and two other people go to the stable and say

Where the gambler is taking the horse and they say that's my horse I'm taking it And the stable hands like I don't know what to do so he lets her take the horse But he follows them And then they go to another stable and they're the stable hand sees Peter and recognizes him And then tips off the Pinkerton's Wow being followed this is before people knew they were followed apparently So the Pickerton's arrive with the cops and Peter is arrested And he's taken to Sarasota County Jail but he doesn't seem concerned at all he's just like totally casual

An American journalist quote he was boastful and very proud of his feats even though he was broke So he's charged with taking the horse But the stable hand then doesn't show up to be a witness That's big Then Peter just says look I actually own the horse And I'm not one of the three people who took the horse and the jury finds him not guilty And also your honor again if you were to tell your hair I would give you a scorching soda Get out of here you scamp I can't stay mad on this guy

So immediately after the trial Peter is once again arrested by immigration authorities Okay In October he was ordered deported for entering the U.S. illegally and a Pinkerton agent Follows him to make sure that he gets on the ship and the ship pulls away without him getting off Sure but that wasn't the problem before I mean he did it you know what I mean he did it He's like okay yeah that's right now there's no way he'll come back because he did it this time He did it last time So he's back in London he's 46 he's broke he can't own horses in England

So once again he sells his story this time to the people Which is okay not the actual people it's the name of the We will take it It's a 20 piece series and it's published starting on January 20th 1935 It's it's it's like half truth half lies like he's just making up shit but then there's some true stuff in there And when it was over when the run was over he made a deal to write six more articles called what punters don't know So giving up the secrets of the trade Now this led him to open up a tipster business right so now he's giving racing tips

You know the best thing to do is paint it I thought it would be very different than this why am I paying for this So while he was while those what punters don't know stories are being published A horse with really long odds won a race and an investigation was begun And the doctor owned the horse turned out to not be a doctor Interesting this is any And the doctor also turned out to have the same address as Peter Barry Okay doctor so

But what it turned out was because he couldn't own horses Peter was now using people to front his owners Okay right so the natural progression now is that he is essentially painting owners Yeah right So the jockey club starts to refuse horses that were owned or trained by associates of Peter or just suspected associates I mean the scrutiny over horses now And so does he feel like he's got wet paint on him a little bit in the back No pass pass pass pass So he's constantly switching horses from owner to owner most of the owners have no idea what's going on

Okay So one investigator wrote Peter knew a waitress at a cafe that lived near him and quote With his usual cunning one day asked her how she would like to own a race horse and she thought that was a great idea Sure So the person would buy a horse and then when the horse won the new owner thought they would sell it right after the race Right So make a huge instant profit and sometimes the horses are auctioned off directly after the race Okay

So that's how they think not only are they going to win the race or just the horse looks good But then on top of that they make money because the horse's value goes up Right okay But well what actually happened is the horse would win and then the horse would disappear Right okay so everybody wins mostly Now Peter had his tipping service near Trafalgo Square Sometimes his tips were fucking awesome And it got to the point where anytime Peter tipped a horse the jockey club became suspicious so he was now giving out tips

Basically saying he was fixing a race Yeah But sometimes but it's but he's not always right I mean some of this is just I don't think always but it also sounds like For the most part his tip line for the most part he's just telling you his crimes Yes Right okay So his tip line is a confession line essentially

So anytime he tips a horse the jockey club looks into that horse because he's just Right So they're like okay But his scam is a lot more complicated now because Before he was just swapping out horses and using fake names but now he's swapping out owners and using real owners I mean it's just imagine trying to understand what's happening Oh god If you get charged you're like

Ah So it caused him to have more financial troubles because more stuff can go wrong and it does And in 1938 he had already been in prison twice for two months for debt Okay So when World War II breaks out racing is suspended for several months So now things just go completely downhill he has no backers He can barely afford to buy a horse at this point he certainly can't afford to buy good ones And he couldn't even make the ones he could buy win on cocaine

The jockey club starts cracking down on trainers who are involved in doping They're even banning ones who are not guilty like they're just cracking down on trainers Paranoid On January 7th 1951 the front page headline of the people was ringer berry in racing sensation I've been doping Peter admits that he has doped over a hundred horses using his own personal concoction that he called the berry tonic He said it did not contain dope He had come up with this other mixture that made horses run fast

And he was still using it on horses for 200 guineas a pop This isn't it this isn't a confession this is a sales pitch This is a marketing yeah Yeah Peter is now selling berry tonic New Co-Carow in Yeah so he's so I mean he's he's basically he's doing integrated marketing Yes a hundred percent and 25 shillings of bottle people are buying it The bottle red quote shake bottle well three and a half hours before race and you will have a winner

Available to anyone Now the people must have realized that they had gotten scammed By printing that story because they a month later start going after Peter hard Okay but that's still a month a full month of being able to sell His tipping business they revealed is a total scam he said he had started offering $1 memberships But after paying the membership no one would hear from him he wouldn't give any tips so he was just taking money Right sure well you didn't tell you what you were a member of The people that analyzed his tonic and called it dangerous dope it was full of potassium bromide caffeine and booze

The idea of giving a horse again I mean it's just like what What world do you think like giving a horse some gin is like this is helpful This will not hinder this will hurt this will help Oh so the people called Peter a menace to the turf And then the Lord complained that one of his horses has been doped and race horses jacked up their security They started giving out passports to anyone who was authorized to enter the stable So now you need a physical sort of ID Right

Still routine testing did not start for ten years the thing that could have fixed all this Feels a little bit like COVID with us So Peter Berry at this point just kind of dropped off the map His final attempt at publishing his confessions had backfired In 1962 he was living in London at Australia House and told an official he never had applied for his World War One medals and now he wanted to And his request was sent to Australia on a March 16th in 1962 he received his 1914-1915 star his British war medal and his victory medal And his award for worst diarrhea The worst diarrhea or best diarrhea depending on how you know

Best diarrhea yeah right it's probably best Peter lived in poverty another 11 years until he was 85 He was in government housing for single men and he died on July 6, 1973 Wow Wow The sources for this Riggers and Rascals A Taste of Sculpt Duggery by David Ashforth and then also another article on Historically which is a cool read by Josh Nathan Kasis called history's greatest racing cheat and his incredible painting trick So look we're going to talk about this in a sec but first I want to say we're also brought to you in part by a pretty litter

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It is crazy when there is one person who can create that much chaos inside of something Yeah It really is One person even if it's not to their own great success it's still the level of fly in the ointment that that guy was is wild It's also fascinating like I just can't imagine living like that like Yeah I guess it's a thrill like it must be a thrill that you're conning people and you're getting away with something because it just seems like I bet it becomes work and I bet it becomes shitty I mean think about at the end if you're you know like if you're doing

I mean the idea first of all that people are looking for you constantly is quite a stress But then on top of it the fact that you have a finite amount of time you feel to make your money and you know I don't know it just it always sounds so stressful just so stressful to have to live that way you know But also it's like if you do it for so long what else are you gonna do You know you can't teach an old dog new tricks you can't pay an old horse new colors Yeah once you're in it for that long I mean if you're a 45 year old stand-up and you don't want to do it anymore I mean yeah good luck good luck Well that's that's what that's part of the thing that I think when you talk about

Well whatever like when you talk about like a green economy that is like the big people are like yeah how are you I mean you get it I mean the idea is like yeah it's not ideal obviously to be like hey you gotta do something totally different All I do is paint horses yeah well they paint walls it's different the ammonia you know so the It also because you know they get criminal records and also that keeps them in the game because then it's doubly worse Like then they do not have skills but then all of a sudden you have a record so what are you gonna do Yeah it's true I mean that's that is the thing we deal with today also it's like yeah I mean you know you just don't know the specifics You don't know the reality but it is it is sad I mean it makes you feel sad for the guy he's a sympathetic figure because You know I mean he does I don't know it's it's not even that you gain great insight into who he was but the way that he's operating

And the reality of those circumstances I mean I don't know it just A lot of terrible things done to horses but you still think this this guy probably was like just someone who's just a liar totally Lost and I think he got it sounds like he got super into doing it like like he got into the like art of it like he was Super into like look what I can do yeah yeah if you're the best at something I mean shit you know it's like Walter White Imagine that the the horse's old trainer did not know that was his horse like that's just fucking crazy like that must be You fall down the wall behind there you're like Christ of God gift God I'm so bloody good at this Yeah yeah I don't know and I mean again you are being like bad to animals but it sounds like the entire sport is bad to animals The entire sport is horse racing still is you know fucking fucked up yeah I mean that that's something that I actually didn't know

Until recently how bad it is because the horse track I live near Santa Anita It's crazy it's maybe the worst race horse track in the in the world if not definitely the country but they've had like They had like over a hundred horses die in a year they kill a lot of horses there and then they bury them on site and then they lie about it and all that shit It is quite a scandal what's going on over there and and it's just so crazy that even in this day and age where like I can understand in the past But now it's just like I mean people are pretty aware of like what's good and bad for animals and aside you take out the eating part of it but just like you are usually allowed to just torture and kill animals for the hell of it Which is essentially what race horsing is like it's not like you can you can make an argument with factory farming that okay meat provides protein There's nothing of value coming out of horse racing there's nothing if you're if you're buying a ticket to watch an animal I can't think of really any circumstance where the animal probably is having good treatment

What about snakes what about snakes like if I bought a ticket to see a snake what the fuck question is what do you even ask me if you bought a ticket to see a snake Here's what here's what happens let me I'm gonna walk you through this we're having a normal I get on I get on an airplane I go to India There might be snakes on the point I go to a small village Dude's like we have a snake here there's eating four people it's a giant python and I go sure can I see it and he goes $5 and I pay him $5 and then we walk out into the forest And he shows me the snake is it are you sure are you I take it in my hand no and he are you saying that's bad you're saying that's bad That that is that is that is not bad but also not what I'm talking about it's also insane and not what I'm talking about it's a thing that doesn't exist So no that's not what I'm talking about the thing that you the thing that doesn't exist you're right to me potentially pokes imaginary holes in my real argument Yes well done David well done well executed thank you seem like it's how many how many times have you told that before because it seems so rehearsed

It's a story I tell my kid all the time Yeah I mean you know it all comes down it all it all comes down to you know people fucking people need money and yeah people do what they you know if you live in a society that's based on paper Then you know you people need money and people are going to do what they can to get money and it's amazing that when people don't have money this stuff will do to survive Yeah I mean yeah and this is very sophisticated but yeah I mean this is this is what you do and I you know people don't want to a lot of people don't want to work They don't want to have a fucking shitty job in an office so okay so you did the horse thing instead okay because you know what's the difference between being a horse painter and throwing horse races And working for an insurance company and denying people healthcare like I'll tell you what is the difference excitement this is exciting Yeah so it is weird

Alright well that was crazy thanks for the Scottish layup that's always fun It's always yeah it's always money I think they call that money We should start signing horses We sign horses With paint Oh good okay Yeah we even do it We bleach ponies

Yeah we bleach mules also We bleach mules and ponies Thank you Munis Good work at the end there Dave Thank you