The river press. [volume] (Fort Benton, Mont.) 1880-current, 1914-03-18
OFFICIAL PAPER Of cHOuTEAU COUNTY
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1871
"ellLY" AND WILLIE"

00OllSneQ Two mLereStlV IIemSs soy
arated by a varying number of pages
but linked together by their indis-
sociable connection. One article told
how "Billy" Sunday, the famous re-
vivalist, was to get $4,000 for a
strenuous eight weeks campaign
against his Satanic majesty in the
city of Pittsburgh, Pa. The other
told how Willie Richie, lightweight
champion of the world expected to
"clean up" something like S100,000
during the next eight or nine months.
Willie has already received offers, &C.
cording to the sporting columns, for
a number of fights at $1,000 a round
800 900 for thirty minutes work,
excluding the time for rests between
rounds.
There are those who will be dis.
posed to complain of the discrimina.
ton practiced in the cases Of these
two eminent Differs. The Sunday
champions will declare that their man
carries a knockout punch in either
lung and they will argue that $4,000
for eight weeks work Is nothing
short of "ham-and" wages, and worthy
the dignity of self.respecting hard.
glove artists-especially in view of
the fact that the Sunday bout was
pulled off in Pittsburgh, where the
man who sits in the corner opposite
Satan has to extend himself in or
der to get any kind of favorable de.
cision.
When one gets outside the sport
atmosphere and contemplates the sit
uation dispossionately, it does seem
rather unfair to pay a pugilist $1O..]
900 for half an hours work, regard.
less of the fact that his task is to-
beat up his opponent, while the man
who takes on" the father Of lies gets
only a paltry $4,000 for eight weeks
work, divided into innumerable
rounds. For merely staying in Pitts
burg eight weeks a well-regulated
Christian ought to get more than that,
according to some more or less popu-
lar ideas of Carnegieville. For fight
ing sin eight weeks without intermis-
sion the purse ought to be about a
billion dollars, according to the light
weight scale.
Billy and Willie seem to be at op-
posite ends of the road of life. 1t
makes one pensive if not positively
mournful to contemplate the dramat-
&c difference in the viewpoints of So
ciety which makes such a %grotesque
division of rewards possible. Here
is n man trying to make the world
better, trying to make people live the
clean and decent life, trying to make
evil take the count. He gets $4,000
for eight weeks of this arduous labor.
Here is another man, trying only to
batter his fellows into submission,
trying only to knock his opponents
lpsensible, trying only to prove that
he can hit the hardest and fastest.
He gets $4,000 for thirty minutes
work-more than the greatest artist
who ever sang or played, more than
the greatest painter v received for
q picture upon which he spent a cor
responding amount of time, more than
the greatest sculptor or poet or in
ventor or b%enefactor of the race ever
received for al hours work or a days
work or q weeks work, more than
the vast majority of them rel re
ceived for any single achievement
and more than many of them received
for a life's work.
The disparity does not end here by
any means. While the slangy, rough
riding, spectacular and picturesque
Billy Sunday gets $4,000 for eight
weeks work. thousands of far ADLER
ministers Of the gospel and friends Of
humanity toll infinitely harder, and
very much more effectively in the
long run, for a mere fraction of $35,
600. 1t is only when one compares
such "hire," even though every la
borer is worthy thereof, with the pa!
of pugilists and artists that $35.00|
seems small. Compared with tn
wages received by most of the people
trying to make the world better it il
princely.-Kansas City Journal.