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f IHETHfn flf AT THE RINGSIDE + + By Barney Nagler NEW YORK, N. Y., June 20.— Twenty years ago, Joe Louis was a young challenger of 23 and Jimmy Braddock was an old champion champion of of 32. 32. Mike Mike champion champion of of 32. 32. Mike Mike f Jacobs was an old pro. He was the one putting on the world heavyweight title fight be-i tween the Brown Bomber and the Cinderella man, which came ta_pass at Coll miskey Park, June 22, 1937. It turned out to be a stirring bout. Louis, it will be re-called, called was was put put down down IHETHfn flf called was was put put down down by an uppercut in the first round. In the eighth he flattened Braddock to become champion and when it was over, in the noise of a dressing room, Louis was asked if winning the title was his most important achievement and he said it was. The other day, hours short of the 20th anniversary of his royal ascension, Louis again wa£ asked if the knockout of Braddock and the title bout was his greatest hour. "Got a lot of kick out of knocking out Max Schmeling the second time," he said. AAA But 20 years ago, Louis was not thinking about Schmeling. Everybody else was because the German had knocked out Louis a year earlier and, most thought, had earned a shot at the title. The dissenters were Louis, Jacobs, Braddock and Joe Gould, the champions manager. At the time, Braddock was contractually bound to the Madison Square Garden Corp., which went to federal court in an effort to fend off the meeting of Braddock and Louis. They did not succeed because a federal jurist named Fake, over in New Jersey, handed down a decision cutting the ties that bound the champ to the Eighth! Avenue arena. He said the Garden had not treated Braddock with mutuality because it had failed contractually to guarantee him a yearly sum for his services. §0 Braddock was named a free agent and Jacobs and Gould were relieved of the problem of hiding the ticket money being collected for the title bout. Both Jacobs and Gould had been fearful lest a court order tie up the .receipts. In self-defense, Gould latched onto a sizable sum of box-office money each night and smuggled it out of Chicago to insure Brad-docks purse. When the court order came down, Gould deposited the loot in a Chicago bank. AAA Years later it was discovered that Braddock and his manager had signed an arcane contract with Jacobs whereby they would share in his profits from all world heavyweight championship bouts for 10 years. Oddly, Jacobs books never again showed such profit. In time, Gould and/or Brad- dock sued Uncle Mike. Disremembered here i is whether they caught up with Jacobs. j It is known, however, that Louis did catch up with Braddock. To this moment Jims upper lip bears a crescent-shaped scar inflicted by the punch that put Braddock down for the count in the eighth round. Braddock had been admonished before-going into the ring to keep his right up. Louis left hook was regarded as a deadly weapon. Gould sat on his haunches below Braddocks corner and kept calling to his man, "Keep your right up high, keep it up." Braddock did. In the eighth round, Louis lashed out with a left hook to the body. Braddock dropped his guard. A right to the jaw put Braddock down. Louis was the world heavyweight champion. Chicagos South Side went wild. Boxing had a wonderful warrior in the forefront. Now, 20 years later, Louis is around ref-ereeing and wrestling, and fighting off the tax collectors. Braddock runs a ships supply business over in New Jersey. His chil- Cantinued on Page forty-Two ! I AT THE RINGSIDE By BARNEY NAGLER Continued from Pago Two dren are grown. He must be a grandpop. His days on home relief are forgotten. He is not rich, but he is warmed by the memories of his time as champion. Somehow the giants of the ring were bigger then. These days they are something less than awesome. But time is a trickster. And 20 years are a mountain of minutes. No steam shovel can cut them down. Looking back, Braddock said, "Louis was a great champion. If I beat him that night 20 years ago, I might have had a few more fights and hung them up. Louis, hed have become champion no matter what happened." Twenty years later Braddock is stilt champ.
