The Hot-Shot Riding Academy was a gambling and drinking spot that purported to be an interracial riding academy but, according to the Call & Post, had “few horses, but plenty of ‘white mule.'” It was located two miles east of Oberlin on the Oberlin-Elyria Road. The operation opened in early 1955 and quickly became an irritant to neighbors, who warned the Lorain County Sheriff’s Department they intended to form a “vigilante group” to “smoke out” club owner Roy Dixon and his patrons if law enforcement did not take action. In March 1955, the sheriff and liquor agents raided Dixon’s establishment and seized liquor, wine, beer, marijuana, revolvers, and policy slips. It was not Dixon’s first brush with the law. In 1951, he had been arrested in the eastern Cuyahoga County village of Pepper Pike on charges of running a gambling operation at the home of Mr. and Mrs. James Minor, then the sole Black homeowners in the village, and sentenced to the Workhouse. Upon his release, he had moved to Oberlin and resumed his gambling operation until the 1955 raid.
Additional information coming soon.
Resources
- “Numbers Raid Hits Pepper Pike Home.” Call & Post. February 17, 1951.
- “Wild Doin’s at ‘Ranch’ Send Roy Dixon to Jail.” Call & Post. March 5, 1955.