Imperial Valley press. (El Centro, Calif.) 1907-current, 1927-07-13
BY HENRY L. FARRELL
Omitted Press Sports Editor)

(Un1teQ FreSS OpoTJS hulCoI)
NEW YORK, July 13.-Whatever
may be said of his tendency to adj
NIT that he can lick anyone, Jack
Sharkey is no rough neck and he is
not a dumbbell. Much like Jack
Dempsey, whom he is to meet in
the Yankee Stadium on July 81, he
had no college education, but he has
picked up a lot of practical know
ledge and he doesn t use "dees and
I, dems' lin his conversation.
He had to leave the parochial
school in the eighth grade and went
to work when he was fourteen in
the Endicott-J Johnson shoe factory
hooking soles to uppers. He work.
ed there two years and then went
to Bridgeport, Conn, where he
threw gravel into concrete mixer.
He went back home shortly after
and went to work shoveling coal.
He wanted to enlist during the
war but his parents objected on ac-
count of his age and he left the
paternal rock again and came to
New York where he went to work
as a day laborer. He then got a
job in the Jersey City shipyards
and went back home in 1919 to the
shoe factory.
The following year he left home
again and came New York. He
didn t have much luck finding a job
and when his funds were gone he
followed COB to the Brooklyn
Navy Yard and enlisted.
He had to do hitch of one year
on the training ship at Newport be-
fore he could go to sea and it was
there he had his experience as a
singer about the marines and his
first fight.
When the time came to 90 to sea
he was assigned to the North Caro-
lima. which was taking the Anna
polls midshipmcn on their training
cruise. During the cruise he had
about fifty bouts with boxers on the
crew and he finally won the Allan
tic Fleet championship on Column
bus Day 1922 He recalls that it
was ON Columbus Pay four years
later that he made his great fight
against Harry N:;is
That WAS ti1it that always WI
hc talked about Per it exploded the
fable of the MACK menace. Wills
had been par; cod for years as the
greatest heavyweight in the ring
and no one would fight him until
Sharkey came along.
Previous to this time Sharkcy was
rated little more than a good Bos-
ton heavyweight who did most of
his fighting around home but when
he challenged Wills, the boys start
ed looking up his record.
The record wasn't good enough
looking to warrant his bravado and
it was recalled that in one fight in
New York against Sailor Eddie
Huffman his work was questioned
and he was called before the com
mission and told there was a sus-
picion that he had held up his OPP
ponent.
81 beat him, didn Il i? Have you
got rule that makes fighter
knock out his man Il thought they
called it boxing in New York
II was at that time that William
Muldoon, the veteran commissioner,
looked him over and made the rash
prediction that he would be the
champion some day. Muldoon drove
the Dcmpscy-Tunncy fight out of
New York by sticking stubbornly to
the contention that Sharkey was the
man to fight Dempsey and it was
Muldoon who stuck to Sharkey when
everyone was yelling that it would
be murder and that Wills would
feast on another set up that might
ruin the game.
When Sharkcy came into the ring
he glarcd right across at Wills.
When they were called together for
instructions Sharkey looked him
over with snecr and glare that
forced the negro s eyes to the floor.
A microphone was IN the corner
and Sharkey was asked to say some
thing to the radio listeners.
- II knock him ont sure as hell ~
he yelled pecring directly at Wills.
He didn t knock him out but he
gave Wills the worst beating he ever
had taken and forced him TO run ont
on foul.
Sharkey wcrt like child when
tho referee refused TO let them CON
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