The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1905-10-29
A PLEA FOR PUGILISM
sY BOB FITzsIMMoNs.
BY BOB FtTZSIMMoNS.
The Worlds Exchampon There's Nothing
Match.

the country, and the job was DON
Boxing was deader than any doorknoS
and il looks as if it might stay so somf
time yet.
Don't let anyone hand you that old
( brutality gag. II was crookedness and
bunco that did it. There's nothing
/ brutal in q good boxing match.
The men with red blood want 10 see
il, and like TO see il. and it gives them
healthy desire to go aHd do some
muscle building ON their own account.
and maybe I'm going To shock few
thin skinned folks right here, but III
1 stand for that. women like TO gee
I trials OF strength, too and they would
patronize II if IL wasn't considered too
coarse for their delicate minds.
As far as I know the average woman
Of normal tendencies has a high re-
gard Tor strength in the male animal:
whether it's mental strength, bodily
strength or moral strength, and from
all down histoTy's pages, women nave
witnessed such exhibitions as nave
been held in public. Am wrong,
ladies? / don't think So
man might go back to the grand
old game of fox hunting, and everyone
would agree that il was a great game
IA little tough on the fox. but SOS The
ahattoir tough on the hog: and then
YOU put the fox hunting business on
a crooked commercial basis and see
how Ions il would last. Just see how
hard it is 10 this daY to keep amateur
sport clean. Every now and then
there's a howl that something's wrong
about it. but il is kept pretty clean.
You let the professional lads get to
running good clean sport for what
there's in it, and see where that sport
lands; down in the gutter. where
theyV put pugilism today, and
through no fault of the game nor The
men doing it. It's the crooks every
time
It's just as dishonest to play crooked
games with sport as if is TO pick poclS-
cts. and the pickpockets got 10 work
IN a good many states. and finally
worked themselves out of a good easy
thing. | guess it's the old story of the
golden goose. for I see d whole lot If
them at work nowadays where they
ought to have been years ago. II
some OF these good refOrmers would
Just look at the cold clear facts i'm the
case and try to understand the aver
age human temperament. there would
be less talk about the brutality of nlize
fighting.
Some of these people howl that itE
only done for the money that's in Il.
f'NIAF may UC 81. buL j want 10 ask
those folks just how many baseball
games, how many football games. how
many horse races there would De If
II was a free for all. and I'd also like
To ind out just how many Of the re-
formers would go on reforming if
there wasn't something i'm il for them.
It's d fair question. I'd like to hear if.
I'm willing TO listen to reason. and I
claim to know something about the
lighting business, and all brands of it.
I ought 20. I've got trimmed enough
from the crooked kind I'd also like to
know from some of those high end
mighty gentlemen who managed 10 Put
a crimp into the boxing business, Z it,
any worse to smash a mans nose or
black his eye than ii is to put an ever,
lasting dent in his soul. or make MS
moral nature twist up into several diff
ferent kinds of knots.
Copyright, 1905, by Joseph B. Bowles.)