An Appreciation, by T.D. Thornton
The phrase “larger than life” doesn't do justice to describing Jim Hannon, the Runyonesque race caller known for his booming bass voice, charismatic showmanship, and roaring, motorboat-like laugh that resonated through the press boxes of New England racetracks since 1953. He died on Aug. 28 from natural causes at a hospice facility in Danvers, Massachusetts, after having recently suffered a fall. At age 92, he was believed to have been the nation's oldest retired Thoroughbred announcer.
An entire generation of fans has evolved since “Big Jim” (as he preferred to be called) last regularly “hollered horses” (his preferred job description) at Suffolk Downs and Rockingham Park. Even though the region's racing is now gone–Hannon outlived the Thoroughbred era on his home circuit by one year–legions of New Englanders will forever associate a day at the races with his gravel-throated, growling calls punctuated by enthusiastic catch phrases like “Here they come for the money!” and the emphatic “Put a ring around” so-and-so, which meant Big Jim deemed a horse to be so home free in deep stretch that you might as well circle its number in your program as the winner.
Hannon grew up on the North Shore of Massachusetts, not far from Suffolk Downs. After serving two stints in the Army and earning a business administration degree from Boston University, he got a part-time job as a concessions hawker at the track. When he got fired for reading the Racing Form instead of selling pastrami sandwiches, Hannon gambled on making a career out of manning the microphone. In 1953, when race calling jobs were largely passed down via apprenticeship, young Jim landed the coveted assistant's job to well-respected Suffolk announcer Babe Rubenstein. He proved to be a quick and highly personable study.
In 1954 Hannon got his first full-time announcing job at Scarborough Downs. Over the next few years, as he built a reputation as one of the most identifiable East Coast callers, other gigs followed: Delaware Park, Charles Town, Beulah Park and Timonium, to name a few, plus stints at nearly every stop on the old New England circuit.
The mid-1960s were a grand time to be a horse hollerer in the New England. In addition to Boston's Suffolk Downs, the Rock in New Hampshire, and Scarborough in Maine, the region's racing then included Lincoln Downs and Narragansett Park in Rhode Island, Green Mountain Park in Vermont, and a bevy of country fairs in Massachusetts. At one time or another, Big Jim manned the mic at nearly every one of those venues. “God gave me the voice and I've always loved sports,” he was often quoted in the numerous press clippings that chronicled his rise.
Hannon was adept at using the technologies of his time to earn a little extra income and promote the sport with a passion. Unfortunately, recordings of his years of feature race radio broadcasts are long gone, as are the hundreds (thousands?) of 45 RPM records of his calls that Big Jim produced and sold to winning owners. Yet thanks to the internet, you can still hear Hannon's ad-libbed recreations of famous races that were used in newsreel-style recaps (view one here).
Legend has it that Hannon turned down a job offer from Churchill Downs because even the honor of calling the Kentucky Derby wasn't enough to get him to uproot his family from the Boston area he so loved. In 1969, Rubenstein retired at age 73 and passed the Suffolk Downs microphone to Hannon, then 41. As racing in New England ballooned to a year-round endeavor, Suffolk became Big Jim's primary gig, and he settled in for a two-decade run.
His first two seasons as the full-time voice of Suffolk coincided with the zany but brief Bill Veeck tenure of running the track. The maverick pro baseball team owner was known for conjuring up wacky promotions, and in his memoir, Thirty Tons A Day, Veeck credited Hannon with being the pitchman whose off-the-cuff schtick really got fans into the revelry. Big Jim gleefully narrated Halloween scavenger hunts for toy black cats hidden around the track and “called” a mock Ben Hur chariot race in the infield. When he surprised fans a handful of times a meet by suddenly announcing it was time to play “LLLLLUCKY CHAIRS!” the grandstand resounded with the clattering of thousands of wooden seats popping up all at once as customers frantically searched underneath for prizes stashed before the gates had opened.
If Hannon's calling card was his sonorous cadence that reverberated so strongly it echoed a mile away from Suffolk Downs at Revere Beach, it was a rare departure from that style that defined his most memorable call. That would be the 1987 Massachusetts Handicap, in which locally based Waquoit engaged in a “ding-dong battle to the wire” to eke out a narrow win over powerhouse invader Broad Brush. Big Jim's voice shot up to a never-before-heard register as the two head-bobbed to the finish-he would later openly admit he had been rooting for the hometown hopeful–and it cracked with emotion as the horses hit the wire in a photo finish that was too close to call (relive it here).
After 21 seasons at Suffolk Downs, Hannon's calls went silent in 1989 when the track was mismanaged out of business. Big Jim resurfaced two years later when Rockingham Park's announcer was arrested for growing marijuana, and fans welcomed Hannon back warmly. But when a new ownership reopened Suffolk Downs in 1992, it wanted nothing to do with the old regime, and the rebranding included a new voice. Larry Collmus, then 25, was brought in from California to call the races. Although Hannon, 64, made it a point to be gracious and establish a friendship with his successor, he still harbored some hurt over not being asked back to his old job.
Big Jim presumably could have hollered horses at Rock for as long as he wanted, but a candid slip of the tongue was his demise: One afternoon in 1993 after a cheap claiming race, Hannon commented to the chart caller in the booth next door about the sorry quality of racing. The quip would have gone unnoticed had Hannon not forgotten to first turn off his microphone before uttering, “They're all rats. How can anybody even bet on these things?” The gaffe was piped loud and clear to thousands, many of whom might have shared the same opinion. But his bosses heard the wisecrack too, and regardless of the truth in his statement, Hannon was told not to return after the end of the racing season.
Hannon hung up his binoculars and accepted a job as a Suffolk Downs mutuel clerk. Although toiling in the grandstand five stories and many memories removed from the prestigious position he once occupied was probably not the way he had envisioned winding down a racetrack career, Hannon proudly maintained his dignity and good nature, and you could catch a glint in his eye whenever customers recognized him (or more often, his voice) behind the mutuel line and shouted out a greeting.
Well into the 21st Century, Big Jim continued to stop by the Suffolk Downs press box before his betting window shifts, often reverting to what I imagined he was like at the prime of his personality–laughing, crooning snippets of jazz standards; mixing, mingling, and just having fun swapping jokes and racetrack rumors. Hannon was especially supportive of the younger press box staffers just breaking into the sport, and he sometimes told them in a reflective tone to never forget that whatever you do in life, “You meet the same people on your way back down the ladder of success that you once passed on the way up.”
By 2008, there was quite a bit of sentiment that Hannon had never been given a proper sendoff considering how much he had contributed to New England racing. As Big Jim neared his 80th birthday, another new ownership group took over Suffolk Downs. The new management team wanted to host a day in his honor, and when they broached the idea to Big Jim, they asked if he felt up to calling a couple of races. Not only did Hannon enthusiastically and immediately say yes, but he proposed an unexpected treat: He wanted to belt out the National Anthem from the winner's circle on his special day. And belt it out Big Jim did, in a crisp, resounding baritone honed by years of singing in local variety shows as a hobby.
By this point, Collmus had moved on to bigger and better race calling gigs, and I had been granted the privilege of announcing the Suffolk Downs races. Hannon had hosted a meet-and-greet with fans that went on longer than expected after his singing of the Anthem, and he had been rushed to the rooftop a bit winded amid the hubbub. I stood by to assist with the newfangled headset but just tried to let Big Jim find his rhythm as he warmed up by repeating horse names and matching them to silks and cap colors. He hadn't called a race in 15 years, but I was more jittery than he was.
Just before the horses loaded, Hannon lowered his binoculars and gazed out at the vast green expanse of the Suffolk infield and the salt marshes and Atlantic Ocean beyond, one of the most magnificent views in all of Boston. “You know, I came to the track for 40 years to do my job,” he said to me with a wry smile. “And I never once considered it work.”
Then Big Jim flipped open the microphone and gave the crowd what it had come to hear–his signature pre-start “Now they're all in!” barked in classic basso profundo Hannon style. Cheers rose skyward from the grandstand apron as the gates crashed open and the race went off.
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