“Offtrack Betting: There’s a New Game in Town; First Offtrack Bet System in U.S. Opens Here Thursday” was the title of a story in the New York (NY) Times on April 4, 1971. The first OTB opened at Manhattan’s Grand Central Terminal.
OTB’s slogan that opening week was: “Nothing Brightens the Rat Race Like a Horse Race.”
Wikipedia: Off-track betting
Off-track betting (or OTB; in British English, off-course betting) refers to sanctioned gambling on horse racing outside a race track.
US history
Before the 1970s, only the state of Nevada allowed for off-track betting It became allowed in New York City in 1970, after years of unsuccessful attempts by the city to legalize it. Their success was such that by the 1970s there were a hundred betting parlors in New York City, and twice that number by the late 1980s.[2] In New York City, the thought was that legal off-track betting would increase revenue while at the same time decrease illegal gambling activity, but one effect of the legalization was the decrease of revenue at the race tracks. The 1978 Interstate Horseracing Act[3] struck a compromise between the interests of horse tracks and owners, the state, and OTB parlors, and stipulated that OTB revenues were to be distributed among the tracks, the horse owners, and the state. Another stipulation was that no OTB parlor was allowed to operate within 60 miles of a track.[
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In December 2010, the NYC OTB closed due to lack of profitability.
4 April 1971, New York (NY) Times, “Offtrack Betting: There’s a New Game in Town; First Offtrack Bet System in U.S. Opens Here Thursday” by Steve Cady, Sports, pg. S1:
As an OTB advertisement later this week will proclaim: “Nothing Brightens the Rat Race Like a Horse Race.”
Google Books
Grand Central:
How a Train Station Transformed America
By Sam Roberts
New York, NY: Grand Central Publishing
2013
Pg. ?:
In 1971, hundreds of people queued up for two hours or more to place their wagers as the nation’s first off-track betting parlor opened at Grand Central (commuters were already used to a long wait; appropriate to the place, one advertisement proclaimed: “Nothing Brightens the Rat Race Like a Horse Race”).
Twitter
Kevin Depew
@kevindepew
The first NYC OTB’s slogan was “Nothing brightens the rat race like a horse race.” Because of course it was.
6:35 AM - 6 Jan 13
Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.
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Above, Big Apple Corner at 54th Street and Broadway in Manhattan. Google Maps. Stolen and missing, 2021-2024.
Above, John J. Fitz Gerald, from the Aug. 15, 1931, Binghamton (NY) Press, pg. 14.
Listen to Robert Emmerich introduce "The Big Apple," a hit song from 1937. Music written by Bob and performed by Tommy Dorsey's Clambake Seven with Bob on piano. Lyrics written by Buddy Bernier and sung by Edythe Wright. Audio provided by Dorothy Emmerich.
Also listen to a 1937 "The Big Apple" song by Ozzie Nelson and his Orchestra. See a 1929 photo of John J. Fitz Gerald and a 1931 photo of John J. Fitz Gerald.
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