Background
Born in Winnsboro, South Carolina, at age fifteen he and his mother moved to Seattle, Washington.
Born in Winnsboro, South Carolina, at age fifteen he and his mother moved to Seattle, Washington.
He began working at the Longacres Racetrack in nearby Renton, Washington then as an apprentice jockey rode in his first race at the Ak-Sar-Ben Racetrack in Omaha, Nebraska. In 1948, younger brother John Weldon Glisson would also become a jockey. Within a few years, Gordon Glisson developed into a top jockey and in the 1948-1949 winter racing season he led all jockeys at Santa Anita Park in wins.
In 1950, Glisson was the first recipient of the newly created George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award given to a successful Thoroughbred racing jockey in North America who demonstrates high standards of personal and professional conduct, on and off the racetrack.
In 2003, he was nominated for the Washington Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame. Gordon Glisson was living in Ojai, California when he died in 1997 at the Sherman Oaks Burn Center following an accident at his home.
A fan favorite, The New Yorker magazine of March 5, 1949 (p 79) wrote that "What impresses horsemen most is that his style is remarkably like that of the late George Woolf, even to the coolness he shows in tight finishes." In a similar vein, the October 31, 1949 issue of TIME magazine did an article on Gordon Glisson titled "The Kid with the Cold Eye.".