“Those black ashy short legs and big teeth of yours cannot ride a horse, Ada, tell her grandma, not to mention, there are few black jockeys.” Ada’s sister, May said. “Young lady, language please, you don’t see your grandpa calling me out on my retainer,” grandma retorted. And I'll have you know that thirteen of the fifteen jockeys in the first Kentucky Derby on May 17th, 1875 were African American. See, they raised them as slaves taking care of plantations and horses and were indignant when fifteen of the first twenty-eight Kentucky Derby wins came from black jockeys. It's like they were flying on them horses. I’ll say, at 19, Oliver Lewis was the first jockey to win, riding Aristides, for black trainer, Ansel Williamson. Lewis set the record when he rode a whole mile and a half, in merely 2 minutes and 37.75 seconds. The black jockeys frankly carried their A game, for we had 15-year-old African American jockeys like Alonzo “Lonnie” Clayton and James “soup” Perkins winning the Kentucky Derby in 1892 and 1895 respectively. Unfortunately, these wins couldn't be stomached by racists so they looked for all possible ways of pushing them out, be it beating the jockeys and their horses during races or introducing and enforcing Jim Crow laws that were so segregative. “And here I thought May a sore loser”, Ada said, to which grandma replied, “I know child, these people were worse as come 1902, Jimmy Winkfield was the last black Jockey to win the Kentucky Derby. So Ada, do not blame your sister for thinking there are no black jockeys as it’s of recent in 2000, that blacks came back to the sport with Marlon St Julien becoming the first African American to ride in the Kentucky Derby since 1921. I need you to see your skin color when they say the Kentucky Derby, even though most will not acknowledge it. Like Muhammad Ali said,“ I am America. I am the part you won't recognize. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours;...” And if you think these black jockeys were great, I'll have to tell you about Isaac Murphy, the one referred to as “ the prince of jockeys"