Sammy Nixon became a racecourse legend in the 1950s and 1960s. Dave Fowler discovers that the Brummie bookmaker has lost none of the wit, charm and patter that made him a giant of the game.



'I was always a grafter and a good one at that,' starts retired bookmaking legend Sammy Nixon, getting in the first round at The Crown on Birmingham's Station Street. 'In my twenties I used this moody telephone on the course to get the punters going. The wire ran to a stool with coats on top. A light would come on and I'd pretend to take calls from other courses.