Ring Lardner
Philadelphia Inquirer/June 22, 1919
TOLEDO, O., June 21.—Gents: Well, gents, I lit into Toledo tonight with a pocket full of raisins, but no rye, and I am supposed to write you something every day about how the fighters is coming along, but I hope you will excuse me this time for not going out to either one of them camps as the first thing a man has to do when you land in Toledo is look for a bed, which is about as plentiful here as a beer garden. But I expect to get myself parked somewheres tonight, and by tomorrow I will have time to go out and overlook the boys in their training and give you the real inside dope on how the big fiasco is coming out, though I may not get into Willard’s camp, as they say he is charging everybody 25 cents apiece to see him work, hence the expression training “quarters.”
But even if I can’t afford to watch the big fellow, as I have nicknamed him, I am all ready well acquainted with him and though I have never seen him fight I have seen him eat and it kind of makes me half smile when I hear people say that Dempsey will get him with stomach punches as his stomach has stood up under more punishment than any little upstart like Dempsey can meat out you might say.
Another thing that kind of spreads my risibles is this stuff about Jess’s being too old to put up a real fight. He says himself that he is 36 and Tom Jones says he is 40, but what of it. Look at Foch.
And also they have got a hotel full of so called fight experts here that claims that Jack the giant killer will wind it up with a knock out but they don’t seem to figure that Bill Tate which has been standing up in front of Jack every day for a month and which is a couple size smaller than Jess hasn’t been knocked out yet in a month, so what is Jack going to do to Jess in one afternoon.
On the other hand certain birds claims that Jess is too big for Jack and a good little man can’t never lick a good big man. Well we will have to grant that the both of them is good men but still and all I don’t know if you know it or not but I am bigger than Dempsey and if I was matched up with Benny Leonard, which isn’t knee high to a grass hopper along the side of me, I wouldn’t bet the war tax on myself. So you see what I think of a good little man vs. a good big man and if the little man is the best man why good night big man.
Well, I suppose a lot of gents will wonder how a bird that has wrote baseball all their life knows anything about fighting but I done most of my baseball experting in old Chi nicknamed Chicago and that is where they combine one with the other you might say and it was less than a month ago when I was out to the White Sox pk and just a bout dozing off when the next thing you know Speaker and Gandil was in a little misunderstanding that went one round to no decision but afterwards I asked several fight critics who they thought won and they all thought the same like I did and I don’t know if Gandil was betting on himself or not but any way he lost his shirt. And another thing I want to say about myself is that I will write fair and impartial and with no fears and flavors and come right out and say what I think about the two beneficiarys because while I have met the both of them neither one ever asked for the check while I was amongst them and I am not afraid of neither one of them because I don’t believe Jess or Jack would lay a hand on anybody for less than $100,000 or $27,500 respectively and I am certainly not going to offer them that and they’s very few people that would pay $60 a seat to see it though several bids I know would give that amount to have it done.
Well as I say I haven’t had time yet to overlook either of the two matadors, but when I come into this hotel tonight I bumped into Ad Thacher of Toledo that the papers said he had a $50,000 interest in the brawl and nobody denied it except Ad Thacher and Tex Rickard and Frank Flournoy but any way he is a wise bird and he’s been on the ground and I had to talk to him about something so I asked him if it looked like they would have a big house and he said ‘”Oh yes, because they tell me that everybody that was picked up for referee have got reservations.”
Well after I had gave up hopes of starting a flirtation with the room clerk I writhed over to the news stand to buy me something to read in the case I would have to park vs. a pillar all night and the book I got a hold of is called Toledo and it certainly grips a man’s interest from cover to cover. As a lot of you gents probably hasn’t seen this book or ever will see it you wouldn’t know unless I told you that Toledo is the largest clover seed market in the world and the third largest roaster of coffees and excels all ports on the Great Lakes in tonnage of cargo coal and has got the fourth biggest zoo in the U. S., which is located in this hotel to judge by the eardrums. That’s Toledo, gents, and the book says the town’s motto is “I serve, I conquer,” and I don’t know if the last part of it is true or not but so far the service is punk.
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