The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1921-02-03

Montana II many interesting DOuLs
being scheduled at Butte, Helena
Great Falls and other towns in the
state for the spring months, fight
fans are wont to gather and discuss
old ring battles that they have seen,
and there have been many famous
ones in Montana's history, from the
time of the redoubtable Con Orem OF
the days of the COS, who fought be-
fore the miners of Virginia City and
Bannack, down to a decade Or two
ago, when the pastime of the squared
circle began to wane for a time.
At Helena on January 81 a likely
youngster from the Pacific coast, who
has taken on the ring name of
Young Stanley Ketchel," is signed
to meet another w~elterweight known
as Simonich, and the winner will
probably be picked to fight before
the American Legion at Great Falls
on February IA, and his opponent
will probably be Tommy Comiskey of
st. Paul a cousin and protege of the
we'll known Twin City boxer, Mike
Gibbons.
The coming bout at Helena will
stir in the memories of older Mon
tana devotees of boxing recollections
of the original Stanley Ketchel, who
began his boxing career in Montana
Is years ago and who soon won a rep
tation as the best middleweight of
his day and n of the greatest fight
ers who ever donned a glove. In fact
his first real victory, when he knock
ed out Joe Thomas in the 32nd round
of their second meeting, at Colma,
Calf, on Labor Day, 1907, is de-
clared by many ring experts to be
the greatest fight of all time, and
this view is shared by Billy Roche of
New York, the veteran referee, who
has seen every important ring bat
tie for 80 years and who was the
third mar in the ring at the Ketchel-
Thomas fight In question.
Was Cyclonic Contest
"You can talk about the Walcott-
Lavigne, Handler-O'Brien, Maher-
Rubin, O'Brien-Ketchel and other
contests the boxing fans a v about"
said Roche in a recent interview "but
in my mind none of them can COM
pare with the second of the Ketchel-
Thomas fights in 1907. 1t was the
greatest fight I ever saw, and there
are not many of the big ones l have
not seen in modern ring history.
Besides the fights in America, I saw
a couple of thousand mixups of the
doughboys behind the lines in France
but in my ring experience have
I seer as fiercely-fought and as cy-
clonic a contest as that which ended
with Ketchel knocking out Thomas
in the thirty-second round at Colma
IA years ago."
Montana boxing fans will remem-
Der that in 1905, Ketchel began to
acquire a reputation as a preliminary
fighter at Butte, and the following
winter he spent in Great Falls, where
he managed to get in enough four
and siX-round contests to keep him
self alive, and not much more. The
lad had no money and would not
work, but he had an overpowering
ambition to become a great fighter,
and the local fight fans used to say
that he trained on a lemon. Ger
he had mighty little to eat in
those days.
At that time there was in Great
a two-handed Electromagnetic
named Tommy Riley, who had many
of the elements of a great fighter
in his day. He took Ketchel under
his wing and tried to teach him box
but Ketchel did not have the
making of a boxer and never did be-
come clever with the gloves. 1t was
his gameness, his logged determine
ton, marvellous stamina and his abil-
ity to deliver a terrible blow that
won him the middleweight champion
ship of the world. He always re-
NAMED a clumsy fighter, but it was
Riley who taught him the rudiments
Of the art and who showed him how
to train.
Heads for Nevada /
In the spring of 1906 things got
tough for Ketchel in Montana.
The boxing game was at low ebb.
He left Great Falls for Billings, and
ing him there, he headed for the
Nevada gold camps. 1t was there
hat Roche, who refereed his great
battle with Thomas, first saw him,
md he describes the incident as fol-
oWs:
''The first time I say Ketchel was
1T Tonopah, New, in November, 1906.
It was just after the Gans-Nelson
light at Goldfield. Realizing what a
Doom Goldfield received from the
5ans-Nelson bout, the citizens of
.Tonopah, the rival mining camp, de-
,ided that Tonopah would try to get
/ little publicity in a like way. SO
hey called me on from San Francis
20, where I was associated with jim
ny Coffroth, to help out.
1--WE matched Joe Cans and Kid
Ierman of Chicago to fight at Tono-
,ah on New Years day, 1907. / was
lifting in the Miners Rest going over
letails with the proprietor, Jim Ri
ey, who was also the chairman of the