Article by Chris Pitt
Reuben ‘Jimmy’ Wimbush was born on December 31, 1916. He was apprenticed to A. T. Reader who trained at Drury House, Doncaster and rode his first winner on a horse named Bowshot in an apprentices’ race at Catterick on July 31, 1936. He rode as a freelance in 1938 and 1939 after completing his apprenticeship.
Resuming riding after the war, Jimmy lived in Doncaster and could ride at 7st 4lb. However, winners were few and far between. He only rode two during the whole of the 1950s, these being Shimmering Way for Percy Vasey in the Bentley Memorial Maiden Handicap at Pontefract on April 20, 1955, and Fabricator for Tommy Shedden in the Springside Juvenile Selling Plate at Bogside on July 26, 1958.
He continued for another ten years after that Bogside victory but rode no more winners. One of his final rides was on Wakening for Tony Doyle in a two-year-old maiden fillies race at Beverley on May 11, 1968. He hung up his saddle at the end of that season.
Reuben Wimbush died in 1981, aged 64.