Page
FAME in their
FISTS
PART FOUR
THE CHINA MAIL, TUESDAY, AUGUST 1, 1961:
Tape Recorder
'JOHN L'-king of the TRANSICORDER TR
prize ring
In his ferocious prime he was a great blarneying, barrel of a man who ··
drank champagne by the quart and whisky by the bottle.
At the beginning of the twentieth century he was an American institu- tion-the greatest national hero, next to old Abe Lincoln, the United States had ever possessed. "Champion of Champions" they called him the finest fighter who ever lived.
His JAMU พร JOHN I Sullivan....
"John 1...... The Buston Strong Buy." In those days it was distinellon just to shake hands with o man who could bonst he had clasped the huge, red mist of John Lawrence Sulpivna.
Sullivan was an immortal: a giant of the qualight tra; un lucredible. awashbuckling Agure with bristing. waxed nioustaches and сус that glowered like hot coals.
When he strodu into some plush Victorian saloon and bawled: "My name is John L. Sullivan and I can lick
alive," leaser
Any
blanches and To one risked
even the ghost of a grin.
Indeed,
frean right beginning. Sullivan
צמיגי
the
ก
bourtful, overpowering charac fer but on Herculean times.
J21
INVINCIBLE
hirnsill--and
int:ver
-by-
ALAN HOBY
This was the blg: raw, bel- lowing ham who was as con descendingly famlilar with royalty да he Was with
commoners.
'Sullivan
allowed
INCON
he feared no
JOHN L. SULLIVAN was a giant. man, and once knocked out 60 challangers in eight months. He earned thousands of dollars-but had only 15 when he died at 60.
Almost to a man they adored and doted on old "John L. 'und here ht was, to their Intense relief, in the pink, his skin glowing and gleaming with health.
But the carly rounds favour- ed the tough Kilrain, and the buzzing tongues of the crowed wore frozen into a mesmerised silence.
HAYMAKER
Meanwhile the scorching gun hamatered down and Krain's seconds held an umbrella over his head between rounds.
But Sullivan, contemntuous, spliting Insults, not only scorned such elfete aids. He wouldn't even sit down.
"What the hell's the use?" he growled. "I only got
to get right up again, ain't
- Blatt-way through the gruelling brawl, Sullivan drank some tea laced with whisky.
He was immediately sick, and Kirain, approuching, suggested the contest should be called of in Kilroin's favour.
In the seventh Kilrain tore William Sullivan's cur almost from his Muldoon, one of the strletest head with haymaking right tramers in the business, to take and then, laughing, went to him in hand,
carta without being letched, Muldoon was utterly ruthless, This was perfectly permissl- He was not scared of this ble under Prize Bing rules--the hobbling wreek they called modern Queensberry code was "John L Moreover, the human not yet in force-but KBrain's body to him Was ukin to a smothering, hit and go-to- ground tacties only increased Sullivan's choler to breaking by point.
When he visited London he was introduced to the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII. The meeting took place in the Guards zymnasium near sacred edifice, James's Barracks, and the story goos that Sullivan addressed the future King of England In the following homely term
"How are ye, Prince?" said John aftably. "Gilad to meet
LOATHED IT
"I will get Sullivan Atler thun he has ever been in his life." Muldoon promised, "but only on one condition-that he obey's
ye."
When, after a late breakfast, me implicitly." it consisted of hot cuts, cold In vain Sullivan ranted and
and un joista,
Scotch salmon raved and growled his liverish Even as a bay he had instinctive and invincible belief washed down with bitter ale, unce, purter, and French wines the during his long and uproarious Prince of Wales, a keen sports- extraordinary man, felt the muscles in the eatcer it this superiority complex desert hit. mighty arms, the fighter offered
His father, who stood only another pleasuntry. Sft, in, cane from Tralee, Co. Kerry, in "the
than on
Huess you'd rather teet country"; thew with yer fingers while this mother, who weighed yer nose-eh? Haw! Hawl 13st., and has been described as What His Royal Highness
hailed "glantess,"
Athlune.
form
Was
from replied is not known.
Although "John 1." John's parents wanted him to proud to have met the Prince, became a
prospect his opinion prista
of the Engilsh, which led him with alarm,
being a good Irishman, was riot Instead, he was apprenticed high. He once said: "There
of plumbers, and not 15. he had his first full-blooded cannot whip In three rounds."
un Englishman living I scrap with the boy next door.
There was one
Englishman Naturally, John L. Sullivan won however, who punctured Sulbi- -what other result could there
ego at Chantilly, possibly be--and soon he was
he tought him stretching opponents stiffer than
and more than plank in local hauls all over Bosion.
In the ral. The his first paid night final round lasted more than for 10 dollars, and then, like a half an hour. gathering storm, his name--and inre-began to spread for be- yond Boston,
He had
תווכ]
van's bloated
France, where for 39 rounds three hours
SPREE ENDS This Was Charly Mitchell the contest fought He
Dwyer, and when, at last,
The was called off with both fighters Krandiosely ktowa B5 Terror of Boston," and in John's crouching and shivering inder awn modest description of the ine downpour, it was decidco
draw. encounter. "knocked his block the result should be off.".
The verdict "disgusted" the S not yel 21, he boxed in furious Sullivan who had done a benen exhibition with the most of the pressing; but not world middle-weight chamoioh, as much as the night he spent Mike Donovan and hit afterwards in a French prison Donovan so hard in the third after being arrested by a troop round that when the latter fell of French police. Prize fighting to the canvas he broke his nose was outlawed in France at that and strained a wrist.
time.
Indeed, there was no caging
"John L." was never down-
the youthful Sullivan., who, hearted for long, however. once aroused, his face pace After being released from juit *an paymeni of a fine, he got For ve thunderous years he drunk for three solid weeks, chopped
with fury, was an awesome wight in the ring.
+
whole
string of
victims to pieces like firewood uncorked
protests.
Sullivan's reply was charac teristlo. With one thunderbols blow he knocked Kilrain Bai on his back.
The hands of both men were now mashed and bruised. Sullivan wrote later: "My hands Were swollen to three times the size. A friend who normul watched the Aght commented: "The pain was excruciating."
Klain, however, was in even .worse shape. He was in such
he had to be agony
given and morphine.
Grimacing nostrils twitching "John L." blurted his outraged protests to the referee-only to bu jeered at by his arch-enemy Charlie Mitchell. who was one of Kilrain's seconds.
As the rounds reeled off and
two the
grunted mun
any
can lick
alive...
man
In vain he swore he groaned; hit and swore, i was obvious that Kilrain, with his would retire, quit, toke up a
glittering
dented, punch-pocked face, was alc curver
the better wrestler.
new
vaudeville.
in
In the end there was nothing
for it. He had to get it or be branded R hopeless drunk, ravaged and blear-eyed, a fallen idol who had made liquor his god.
the next few months Sullivan lived on Muldoon's He did eight miles road- work at first light every morn- ing-aud he had always loathed rondwork.
For
form.
He drank milk all day and all detested the stuff.
He skipped and punched the bag for hours. He went to bed at nine every night. He was allowed no friends, an entertain meni, nu friendly fog of cigar smoke, no nocturnal safaris to the booze and bright lights of the big city....and no women.
FIT AGAIN
"John L." hated every ghastly second of this purgatory but, gradually, the soft fubby toper disappeared and, in his place, stood the old perfectly-propor2, oned Uzer who had quclled the best fighters on earth.
Sullivan met Kilrain on Q
lumber estate 100 miles from New Orleans,
In 1888, of curse, prize Agh- ing in the Unlied States was illegal.
Bottle after bottio was and its contents down his capacious
called "the włekedest man in became a familiar And then, at last, on February the world"
before clubbing them sensible poured The prize fighter they followers had to make their
with a right hand like a batter throat. ing rom.
+ "I have never seen
man
7. 1882. on the banks of the gure in Paris restaurants and Mississippi, before -a frenzied bistros, audienes which included Oscar Wittle and the trigger-happy drink as he did," declared his bandil Jesse James, Sullivan trainer and second. George inet Paddy Rynn for the bare- McDonald. "Indeed, he Con- knuckle title of the world,
tinued to drink happily and merrily until 1 got him
on the boat back to America:"
The
ONE ROUND
Then just as suddenly Sullivan's alcohalle spree ended He wanted-he said"to return
Aghting, a mixture of Waltting Aridi wrestling-under the old London Prize King rules o round lasted unit one of the home sober...." contestants threw or knocked
That was in 1888. A year
down the other-lasted only later, on Monday, July 8, 1889,
John L. Sullivan took part nine founds before, to quote the insk great bare knuckle Agh: "John L." #gain: "Hynn was so disabled the best care of physiat Richburg. Mississippi. clans was required,
It was of this slaughter that
RUMOURS
one electrified winess wrote:- His opponent was the famous 'He was as relentles as a Juke Kilrain, the contest WEB calarpet and as fearless as billed as "for the championship Nlagarn. There wasn't moh of the world" and cach man
Sullivan, Kirein and thir
way to the rendezvous in secret, In special trains,
By the time the Just perspiring load had arrived - the temperature was 103 In the shade the onc avaliable stand WRA crammed. The remaining 3,000 spectators sel or stood as best they could. It was a motley and extra-
ordinary scene. The Negro who had taller through the night setting up the ring and scale watched in amazement na gamblers and gunmen, adven- turers and gentlemen, mitled and fought for senta.
fell out
A boy who had climbed a tree to get a better. view and broke a leg.
A Journalist, hearing before- hand that the militin had cut the telegraph wire lo New Orleans, brought along a loft of carrier pigeons, sending off one every 15 minutes.
A fal cardsharp, over- whelmed by the excitement and
on God's green earth who would deposited a 10,000-dollar alde- the heat-drugged air, collapsed
stake backing himself to win. und died.
have licked John L. Sullivan on that day."
A champlon who believed in Aghting, Sullivan barred body except Negroes.
по-
But muny thlogs were
happen before Sullivan cimbed Info the ring with the lowering, grim-faced Kürain.
10 With one oxesplich, it was
an all-male audience
The solitary wenan present was Sullivan' mistress, ex- On one royal progress through
Soon after his return to
burlesque queen Ann Livings- The States ho fellened 80 hulk- America he was taken ill neat. ten, wilo watched The fight ing opponent out of 60 in eight his birthplare, Boston.
disguised as a moti, months more than seven a He had for "Jolm L." never
more than a round,
month. Fow of them lasted did anything by holves A 75 ROUNDS
aging lever, chronie
terrible pains, trouble, partial paralysis,
The
Today, of course, in an age of machines and grey conformity, mould whilch produced John 1. and his kind been broken-probably for ever, But in Sullivan's rumbustious and outspoken times boxers, like
has
Prime Ministers and "Prealdents,
atomach
a hundred miles from Thus, and the nickering gas-lit saloons and enticing Creule bogaties The rumours dashed from of New Orleans, began the last end to end of the Blates that championship ounter! under he had a parilst stroka,, that Prize Bling rules. He would hover fight again. For 70 vlclous, shuddering
He was in bed for two months roundy John L. Bullivan and surly, millen Kilrain
stage betors and prenehers, were and, at one point, was convinced the
he was about to die. When, at smashed at one another with
expected to be epic figures, con- length, he fever and paralysis their naked fists,
siderably larger than life.
And of all the Olymplan heroes who struited the stage In the heyday of the bustle and the moustaclie .qulte grandiore, both in worda and sellons, as "John L."
began to diminish, he could get about only with the crutches.
Wha eup none
This was the prodigious sinner who, in a stern, sirali leed society, Ilved blatantly with an unmarried woman an exburlesque queen al that, This
blustering was character who thumbed his nore at the lut-lulling Puritan, and regularly dronk a bottle of bourbon after breakfast "to Battle my stomach,"
than over,
Night from the stort Kilrain, Aid of his eyes slits of blue, surprised. the champlon by moving to obese, looking close quarters at cat-like speda." Depressed,
Clinching. the challenger twice his age he was then 30-
with th Martled he began to drink more heavily grappled
Bullivan and flung hins head.
to the ground with I wan this sodden ruin which tong
hultock him backst had to thrash into bond jarring cros shape for the
most important throw.
Karared snorting like fight of his life.
insensed bull, Sullivan tallated by hugging Kärkin In The sisel tentacles of his mema and kurting him to the boarda in the following round. Tho crowd howled their plessure.
"Indeed, when at inst they nonaged to get Sullivan to sign articles to meet the redoubtable Kirein, he weighed more than
17 at-most of it puré tel,
It was with grudging, teichy reluctance, therefore, that
20-
But he was NOT the stronger man nor could he hit with the brutish fury of "John L.“
In the 13th round Sullivan caught Kilrain with sledging right to the head which lifted the challenger clean off his feet. Kilrain was beginning to wilt under the plastering Sullivan was giving him to the body. He felt old and wrecked inside — as if was broken — and something hard to be fed sips of whisky between rounda to keep him going.
Altogether it was estimated that Kirnin drank a quart of whisky during the fight.
the
The
In the 88th round, after near- ly three hours, Sullivan ut last
challenger. Jatter was going to earth once again when Sullivan, feinting with his left, smashed a terrific right uppercut to the jaw.
OUT-PUNCHED
Kilrain, sobbing, staggered, fell tottered by sheer instinet to his feet and was steam- the head hammered around again.. but, by seme miracle, be managed to stay upright.
For the brief remainder of the fight Kilrain was a sickening nud frightening figure. Sullivan's leg-of-mutton fista had beaten. him to a pulp.
Finally, in the 75th round, afler Kilrain had gone down
Four D. Jones NO GOOD YOU BY MADDOCKS
NEVER DARKEN MY SURGERY STEP AGAIN,
YOU FIEND
السلاما
FERDINAND
NANCY
NUMEROUS
FLYING SAUGERS
HAVE BEEN
SEEN LATELY
BLAMING ME DEARIE, IT'S THIS
HAIRY LITTLE
FINE FIGURE OF A
WOMAN,
THAT
from no more than a lap, Mike Donovan, his chief second, fear- ing his man might be killed, tossed in the sponge.
Losted The fight which had two hours and 15 minutes in the furnace of a Mississippi mid- day, was over. "John L" could still out-punch and outlast any man alive.
But even then his adventures were not at an ond, On his way back to New Orleans' the ery went up that the millu had boarded the train.
Sullivan, still in his fighting clothes, jumped through the carriage window and hid in the Dearest swamp. But i was false alarm and the champion wearily holsted his battered Hmbs back on the train.
7
Three years Inter A portly, I ageing Sullivan-he was 34 -*** inst, in his own words "o that Fittle dude frem California," James J. Corbelt in the first world title contest held
uzikler Queensberry rules.
TEETOTAL
But such was the power of his personality that, to most of his countrymen and certainly to every true Irishman breathing he was silit THE Champion.
"I'm' st John
would roar.
right? Haw! Haw!"
L. Sullivan."
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Then to whoever might around: "Have some champagne, boy!"*
retirement
In
afler
un-
The Hong Kong Story
storming round the world, ap- Chinese Croods & Customs Vol. III pearing in minstrel shews, hay Baby Book ing one love affair other, giving ortures and get
ing ingloriously drunk-"John L" renounced the devil.
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He became cetotaler
Rupert Magazines reformed. And he never touched another drop.
Ton Points About Pearls Even his death-lie had ex-Points on Judging Jado actly 15 dollars left died-caused an uproar. When Giles Annual (1960)
when
he
they buried him, it the age of
00, it was so cold they had to Hong Kong Business Symposium use dynamite to break open the Gombols Annual (1960) grave.
NEXT WEEK:
The world's gamest fighter
HORIZONTAL HUMANS~ I'LL NEVER! IIVE IT DOWN, MATE,
NEVER
SAY
THE WORD FRIEND AND
| SHALL. RELEASE THE EVIL SPELL
HAVE YOU SEEN ANY
FLYING SAUCERS, MISTER ?
BRICK BRADFORD
ROTIAN, HOLDS A MUTAR
I PULL THIS „TUISEER AND THE BE IN CONTCOL. HORM
DON'T BE SILLY--- OF COURSE NOT
WAIT... WHATG "THAT' ROAR!?! SPACESHIPS! THAT MUST BE BATURN LBARE'S FATHERS
London Express Service).
SNIP
OKAY!
YOU WIN_
SPLENDID DOWN YOU COME!
THERE'S NO SUCH THING
THE SPELL
IS LIFTED
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