The Warner sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1885-1???, 1886-06-25
A Renaissance Of Fighters.
New York Star.

'front.' OF another man to pound and
be pounded with the fist wickedness
done up in slightly padded kid glove.
The unhappy stranger to the joys of
boxing sees only two men, whom he
believes to be crazy but dosn't dare to
say so, hopping around with the en-
thusiasm of young and misguided
yamecocks, battering each Others
taces out of shape and indulging in
variagated assault and battery. But
the boxer, especially the amateur box
er, is in q state OF ofrapture as long as
the gloves are on his fists, modified
only when hot cross-counter under
the ear of sn upper cut full OF sweet
ness and light that lifts his nose far
toward heaven reminds him that he is
only mortal after ali.
Yet every man who learns the art OF
using his fists instead of the sword and
shield soon finds out that the punish
ment is not so hald to take after all.
Hundreds OF young men who shine in
New York society have developed
strong liking for the fstic science of
late years, and the fever of punching
heads with care is rapidly growing.
Very few men who looked on the old
time prize fights ever cared to try their
own hands at that sort oftihing. The
spectacle of a broken -jawed giant stag
gered to his corner with his shapeless
face dripping blood was not calculated
to attract a man toward learning how
to get himself in the same fix. But in
1878 arose Prof. G. Mcclellan, a good
man, and true, of middle weight, with
great and level head. Thenoble and
truly good Marquis of Queensbury
had formulated a code of benefcent
rules for head and rib banging a few
years before this, in which he sternly
forbade back-heeling whereby the sim
pie minded slugger is easily made to
stand on his head in the midst of
round, or any sort of wrestling,
which always gave the heavy
man the advantage. 1t struck Prof
Mcclellan that it would be q beauti-
full thing to see a pair of evenly match
ed boxers pound each other with thin
ly stuffed boxing gloves on the Queens
berrian plan. He believed that people
would come miles to see such set-to,
so he matched himself against hand
some Michael Donovan, and gave the
tip to scores of young men about
town. They paid fabulous sums OF
money for ticketsito witness the scrim-
mage, and they were happy when they
saw beautiful fight, with lots of
science in it and no raw and bleeding
faces. The professor knew more
about the Marquis than Mr.. Dono van
did, and he got the best of him; but
handsome Mike went home aud stud
led up. Before the end of the year
the pair came together again in the
presence of 100 wealthy young men
and Donovan had the pleasure of scien-
tifcally pounding the professor twice
as hard as the professor pounded him.
ALI this was done in the most grace
full and pleasing way, and the young
men said to themselves that it must
be fine fun, and that boxing was not
such a deadly thing after all. So they
began taking lessons from both of
the fighters, and thus came about tht
renaissance of fisticuff in New York.
The more the young men knew about
sparring, the more they wanted to
see glove fights. Therefore, it was
that they fiocked by thousands to
Madison Square garden to watch the
immortalJ John of Boston, dapper
Charles Mitchell OF England and
youthful Dominick McCaffrey of
Pittsburg wait one another about q
high platform with beautiful, pillow
like, white kid gloves. Thus the ex-
hibitions and the progress OF the fis-
tic science fourished together, until
now New York society is dotted with
sturdy, graceful boxers as the plains
of Lombardy are studded with pop
lars and Parkrow with peanut
stands.
Stand on upper Fifth avenue any
fine Sunday afternoon. You VIII see
scores of clear-skinned, quiet young
fellows in the promenading throng,
faltlessly dressed and almost as llst-
less as the dudes whose elbows rub
theirs. You would not at the flrst
glance think there was a good fight IN
dozen of them, but drop in at New
York athletic club twenty-four hours
later and will see how they can spar.
Donovan their veteran teacher, says
that four three-minute rounds apiece
with two or three of them, send him
home fit to sleep for week. And yet
he is strong, game fighter, and has
battled with his own bare knucks IN
the prize ring for hours at time, and
beaten men whose names are honored
in the world Of sport.
There are no quicker, stronger or
cleverer sparring men in the world
than New Workers." said retired
fighter, "and can't understand how
they have all sprung up SO quickly.
When began to fight for living,