HOLLYWOOD PARK : Everett Remains a Stable Force in Hollypark’s Changing World

The day after the new race track opened in Birmingham, Ala., in 1987, a track executive called his printer with the number of programs that would be needed for the second night of racing.

“We don’t have to print that many,” the printer said. “We’ve got several thousand left over from last night.”

The printer, doing a race-track job for the first time, thought that racing was like a Broadway play, that the actors--that is, the horses--didn’t change from night to night.

At Hollywood Park, the horses also change daily, but the printer needs to be careful about the first page of the program where track officials are listed. By themselves, changes in the names on the board of directors and in the name of the track announcer are enough to keep the printer on his toes.

In a year, Hollywood Park’s board has undergone enough changes to fuel still more scuttlebutt about who’s in charge and who wants to be in charge.

Through all the changes, though, one name is always there, that of Marje Everett, chairman of the board, president of the track, chief executive officer and survivor nonpareil.

Marvin Davis is gone from the board and has sold his Hollywood Park stock. That was probably a boon for Everett, because Davis, a consummate wheeler-dealer, could have bought the joint with pin money and had enough left over for a round of chopped chicken livers at his Beverly Hills delicatessen.

Davis, who never showed an interest in racing to begin with, took his cram course and moved on. Others who have moved on include board members Dan Lufkin and Hal Brown, as well as Louis Wolfson, who at one time owned more stock in the track than anyone except Everett. Warren Williamson reportedly resigned from the board for a few days this spring, then was persuaded by Everett to return.

The new players include Tom Gamel, who settled for a board seat and agreed not to increase his stock holdings after a blatant campaign to oust Everett, and three Everett-inspired appointees to the board--Lodwrick Cook, Allen Paulson and Bruce McNall.

The nomination of McNall to the board this month reportedly brought an outcry from Gamel, who resented reading about it first in The Times. At the same meeting, Gamel attempted to nominate Dee Hubbard to the board, which is still one short of its maximum, but Hubbard’s name has been shuffled into the cobwebs of a committee consisting of Everett, Merv Griffin and John Forsythe.

Everett will never consider Hubbard and Gamel her allies. They were among those who tried to buy Hollywood Park in 1986 for about $135 million, which was then almost 20% above the track’s stock-market price. Hubbard has a financial interest in Los Alamitos, once Hollywood Park’s sister track; and he runs Ruidoso Downs, the quarter horse track in New Mexico, and The Woodlands, a multiple facility for horse and greyhound racing in Kansas City, Kan.

Recently, Hubbard bought enough stock in Hollywood Park to make him one of the track’s largest shareholders. Another investor and board member who, through recent purchases, ranks second to Everett in stock is Harry Ornest, a Beverly Hills sportsman who owns the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League and used to own the St. Louis Blues of the National Hockey League.

Although Ornest, Gamel and Hubbard own almost 20% of the track, they appear to be getting little bang for their bucks, because most of the recent decision-making has been done by Everett, Griffith and Forsythe.

“I don’t know about that,” Ornest said. “What I do know is that I regret that Marvin Davis left the board. He put a lot of time and effort into the company.”

In fact, Davis engineered the sale of Los Alamitos last year for about $71 million, a deal that kept the banks away from financially strapped Hollywood Park’s door.

Hollywood Park’s track announcers have come and gone, the post not being one that provides security. Had the track hired Tom Durkin a few years ago, it might have prevented this revolving door of race callers.

Established as the national television announcer for the six years of the Breeders’ Cup, Durkin has also called races at Hialeah and the Meadowlands. If Trevor Denman isn’t the best track announcer in the country, then Durkin is. Durkin was recently named track announcer at Belmont Park, Aqueduct and Saratoga, starting in September.

Durkin’s interview for the Hollywood Park job apparently started poorly because he came dressed in a green jacket. Everett has an aversion to green and also said that Durkin’s reputation was not much more than that of a “harness announcer.”

Horse Racing Notes

Trainer Wayne Lukas said that he will be under no pressure to move his horses from the late Gene Klein’s training center when Klein’s ranch is sold, probably as soon as next month. Lukas, who has about 55 horses stabled at the facility near Del Mar, is thinking about building his own training center outside California and said that sites in Oklahoma, South Carolina and Florida are possibilities.

Lukas’ Criminal Type, who will try to continue his hot streak by beating Sunday Silence in the $1-million Hollywood Gold Cup Sunday, worked half a mile Thursday in :47 4/5. . . . Opening Verse, another probable for the Gold Cup, worked five-eighths of a mile in 1:00 3/5.

Sam Who, winner of the Hollywood Park Budweiser Breeders’ Cup last year, will try an encore in the six-furlong grass race Sunday. Sam Who worked half a mile on the grass Thursday in :48 1/5. . . . Survive, second to Tis Juliet in the Shuvee Handicap at Belmont Park last month, carries 122 pounds Saturday at Hollywood in the Valkyr Handicap, a six-furlong turf stake for fillies and mares foaled in California.