The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-12-18
CorbeH's Daily Letter
 On Great Sport Topics
By JAMES J. CoRDETr

Jack Johnson's chance to climb to the
 pugilistic heights came about in more
 or less of an accidental way. Johnson was a battle royal warrior
 in Galveston back in 1898 when George
 sisler the famous referee, discovered"
 him. sisler decided that Johnson had
 in him the makings Of a real topnotcher
 if properly handled Through Sis 8
 influence Johnson was taken to Chicago
 and given chance with a negro known
 as Klondike. Johnson lost thef fight. He
 fought a few battles with third and
 fourth raters through 1901 and then
 elected to tackle Joe Chaynski in Gal
 weston. Joe knocked him cold in the
 third round That defeat had the effect
 oe dampening the promoters enthusiasm
 concerning the drawing powers of the
 negro.
 The negro drifted to San Francisco,
 Failing to get matches, he gladly tool
 a job as sparring partner for Kid Carter,
 the middleweight. who was matched to
 take on George Gardner, heralded as the
 champion of that division
 Some days before the Carter Gardner fight, Carter invited a number of sport writers and some of his most intimate friends to his camp. He wanted to prove to them that he was in superb condition. The boys accepted and as the
 opener for his exhibition programme, Carter elected to do some sparring with Johnson, then absolutely unknown on the Pacific coast except as the good -natured, fun-loving human punching bag" for Carter.
 Carter opened up on Johnson with a vicious attack and proceeded to beat the negro all around the ring. Johnson made no real effort to hit back. But in the
 mixup insthe center of the ring Johnson happened to send home a rather stiff punch to Carters stomach, which seemed accidental But that maddened Carter and he went out to beat the negro to
 pulp as q means of punishment Johnson made no effort to fight back for about a minute or so. Meanwhile.
 Carter was sending lefts and rights iwith merciless power to Johnsons head and body One of Carter's punches, car rying almost the full weight of his body behind it, landed against Johnson's ribs. The negro grunted, regained the breath that was knocked out of him temporarily and then things began to happen. Johnson started to fight back. And the elect assemblage was given perhaps the greatest surprise of its career. It had figured all along that Johnson knew nothing of the scientific end of boxing. i It reckoned him only the dubbiest of I dub sparring partners, It thought that l Johnson's only accomplishment in box 1 ing way was his ability to stand up un- der punishment.
 l But Johnson startled them.
 l One minute after the negro had started l to fight back it was evident to every spectator that Carter was due for an ar 1 tistic lacng. Johnson hit Carter when and where he willed, driving him from one side of the ring to the other. Garter 1 was absolutely unable to lay glove | on Johnson from that moment. on John son by show of bewildering speed, l splendid side-stepping, blocking and l ducking, made Carter miss every swing l that he started The more Carter missed ! the more infuriasea he became-and the
 easier 1t was for Johnson to pound him around.
 | Aftr about three minutes of this, other 1 members of Carters camp stepped in and stopped the proceedings. They tried l to patch up the breach between Johnson and his boss-but that was impossible.
 Carter fired Johnson immediately but the