Originally posted by Jim Thurman
.....In that case, Tom Sulman doesn't count (and wouldn't anyway as there have been older in the U.S.).....
I've been wondering about old Tom ever since I posted his age...
I remember Geoff Sykes talking about him at Goodwood in 1955 with the Kangaroo Stable. "I thought to myself, surely they're not going to let that old man race!" he told me, "and here I am a dozen years later letting him race."
Summoning resources regarding his age seems difficult. I have just come across a mention of him in Denis Gregory's Gnoo Blas book which says he was 65 when he won a bunch of races at that circuit in 1953. That would make him 82 when he died.
He's also referred to being the 'racing grandfather' in David McKay's book as he describes plans being made in 1954.
What I have found are mere snippets. His father did have a son by his first marriage and his second marriage was in 1893, he had three sons by that marriage. His wife had died either during or in the forties. He had been competing for decades.