Fairmount legend David Gall, the fifth leading rider of all-time, dies at 79
David Gall, the fifth-winningest North American rider of all-time, died on Sunday morning of natural causes at his home in State College, Pa., where he had recently moved, according to his son. Gall was 79.
Riding mostly at Fairmount Park in Collinsville, Ill., over a 43-year riding career, Gall racked up 7,396 wins from 41,775 mounts. His career total puts him behind only Russell Baze, Laffit Pincay Jr., Bill Shoemaker, and Pat Day on the all-time wins list. (Perry Wayne Ouzts, who is still active, is 192 wins behind in sixth.)
Twice Gall was the leading rider in the U.S. by wins, in 1979 and 1981. On Oct. 18, 1978, he won eight races on a single card at the now defunct Cahokia Downs in Illinois, the first rider to ever accomplish the feat, and he rode seven winners on a card five times.
Born in a small town in Saskatchewan, Canada, Gall began his riding career at small tracks across the western Canadian provinces. He headed south to California but eventually settled in Illinois, where he dominated racing at Fairmount and Cahokia Downs. He was nicknamed “The General.”
Gall was inducted into the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame in 1993, six years before he retired from riding. In 1996, he was also awarded the Avelino Gomez Memorial Award, which is given in Canada to a jockey who has made significant contributions to racing.
Gall trained horses for roughly a decade after his retirement from riding, still based at Fairmount Park. His son Chris said that he had a small farm from which he based his operations. He won 157 races from 1,523 starts before retiring from training in 2011.
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Gall kept a book on jockeys on his coffee table at home and “loved” to tell stories from his riding days, Chris said. His tales often featured his fellow riders, Chris said.
“He really loved being a good rider, and he devoted his entire life to being a good rider,” Chris said. After his retirement from the saddle, “horses are what kept him going. He loved to be around the horses.”
Gall is survived by Chris, daughters Elizabeth and Margaret, and two grandchildren.
A previous version of this article misstated the time and place of David Gall's death. He died Sunday morning in State College, Pa., not Saturday night in College Station, Pa.