Eugene James was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 Thoroughbred horse racing

Thoroughbred horse race

Thoroughbred horse racing is a worldwide sport and industry involving the racing of Thoroughbred horses. It is governed by different national bodies. There are two forms of the sport: Flat racing and National Hunt racing...

 jockey

Jockey

A jockey is an athlete who rides horses in horse racing or steeplechase racing, primarily as a profession. The word also applies to camel riders in camel racing.-Etymology:...

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Born in Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...

, James was a very promising young jockey who began racing in 1930 at age seventeen. According to TIME

Time (magazine)

Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...

 magazine, he "made a sensation" in his first season of racing. Although he didn't start until June, his 138 wins that year ranked him fourth among all North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

n jockeys. Among his first major wins he guided the filly

Filly

A filly is a young female horse too young to be called a mare. There are several specific definitions in use.*In most cases filly is a female horse under the age of four years old....

 Cousin Jo to victory in the 1931 Kentucky Oaks

Kentucky Oaks

The Kentucky Oaks is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old Thoroughbred fillies staged annually in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. The race currently covers 1⅛ miles at Churchill Downs; the horses carry 121 pounds . The Kentucky Oaks is held on the Friday before the Kentucky Derby each year...

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In 1932, Eugene James was the jockey for Burgoo King

Burgoo King

Burgoo King was an American Thoroughbred racehorse who won the first two legs of the U.S. Triple Crown series but who did not run in final race, the Belmont Stakes....

, a colt owned by the prominent horseman Col. Edward R. Bradley

Edward R. Bradley

Colonel Edward Riley Bradley was an American steel mill laborer, gold miner, businessman and philanthropist. As well as a race track proprietor, he was the preeminent owner and breeder of Thoroughbred racehorses in the Southern United States during the first three decades of the 20th Century...

 of Idle Hour Stock Farm

Idle Hour Stock Farm

Idle Hour Stock Farm was a 400 acre thoroughbred horse breeding and training farm near Lexington, Kentucky, United States established in 1906 by Colonel Edward R...

. James rode Burgoo King to victory in both the Kentucky Derby

Kentucky Derby

The Kentucky Derby is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old Thoroughbred horses, held annually in Louisville, Kentucky, United States on the first Saturday in May, capping the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. The race is one and a quarter mile at Churchill Downs. Colts and geldings carry...

 and Preakness Stakes

Preakness Stakes

The Preakness Stakes is an American flat Thoroughbred horse race for three-year-olds held on the third Saturday in May each year at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland. It is a Grade I race run over a distance of 9.5 furlongs on dirt. Colts and geldings carry 126 pounds ; fillies 121 lb...

. The horse was not entered in the Belmont Stakes

Belmont Stakes

The Belmont Stakes is an American Grade I stakes Thoroughbred horse race held every June at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York. It is a 1.5-mile horse race, open to three year old Thoroughbreds. Colts and geldings carry a weight of 126 pounds ; fillies carry 121 pounds...

.

Unfortunately, Eugene James had problems maintaining his weight and suffered from bulimia that became so severe he had to stop riding. Though he was not racing, he was in Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

 in June 1933 when the season at Arlington Park

Arlington Park

Arlington Park is a horse race track in the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights, Illinois. Horse racing in the Chicago region has been a popular sport since the early days of the city in the 1830s, and at one time Chicago had more horse racing tracks than any other major metropolitan area...

 and Hawthorne Race Course

Hawthorne Race Course

Hawthorne Race Course is a race track for horse racing in Stickney/Cicero, Illinois, near Chicago.The oldest continually-run family-owned racetrack in North America, in 2009 the Horseplayers Association of North America introduced a rating system for 65 Thoroughbred racetracks in North America...

 was in full swing. During the evening of June 10, the twenty-year-old James and two friends went to Chicago's popular Oak Street Beach

Oak Street Beach (Chicago, IL)

Oak Street Beach is located on North Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, Illinois, on the shore of Lake Michigan. One of a series of Chicago beaches, the Chicago Park District defines Oak Street Beach as the area from approximately 1550 North Lake Shore Drive to 500 North Lake Shore Drive, including Ohio...

 on Lake Michigan

Lake Michigan

Lake Michigan is one of the five Great Lakes of North America and the only one located entirely within the United States. It is the second largest of the Great Lakes by volume and the third largest by surface area, after Lake Superior and Lake Huron...

 where he went swimming, and drowned

Drowning

Drowning is death from asphyxia due to suffocation caused by water entering the lungs and preventing the absorption of oxygen leading to cerebral hypoxia....

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Eugene James is buried in the Resthaven Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky.