Evening star., 1940-07-05
From the
Press Box
SeuttIe's Ghost Champ
Reported Seen Again
BY JOHN LARDNER,

BY JOHN LARDNER,
Special Correspondent of The Star
NEW YORK, July 5.-Reports
reach me from the West Coast that
the ghost of Seattle is walking again.
This famous hant is harder to lay
to rest than the phantom of the
opera or the shade of Deacon Brown.
He seems to have a world of ecto-
plasmic stamina.
refer, of course, to Seattle's ghost
middleweight champion mysterious
Al Hostak. just when I thought he
was exercised (not exercised; see
dictionary, people begin to hear
him walking the streets again at
midnight.
In fact, the ghost of Seattle has
booked fight for two weeks from
now, a shadowy fight with shad-
owy spook from Chicago named
Tony Zale. If the late Harry Hou-
DIM, the great spirit-exposer, were
alive I would give him a thousand
dollars to 60 to Seattle and prove
that the whole thing is done with
mirrors and telephone wires. I was
brought up to believe that there is
no Hostak, but, short of help from
Houdini, I see no way of clinching
the case.
This guy is real" writes Mr.. E. l..
Swartzlander of Seattle Il have
seen him a number of times"
A Ghost Must Protect
His Future and Family.
That statement is typical OF many
Hostak eyewitness" stories that
come to hand from the haunted city
in Washington. You and 1 may
know there is no Hostak, but he is
very real to the people of Seattle,
just as the ghost of Banquo was real
to Macbeth. 1t takes certain state
of mind-and a fat amount of rail-
road fare-to see him.
Till these last reports began to
trickle eastward there was good rea-
son to believe that the phantom had
left Seattle to do his haunting in
greener pastures Few had seen or
heard of him since the night he
busted his ghostly hand on Zale's
knob last winter
You know how it is with ghosts
They go where the business is. 1t
began to look as though the ghost
of Seattle had gone to Scotland to
accept tempting offer to haunt
Balmoral Castle, where the regular
ghost had been pensioned off be-
cause of extreme old age, leaving
the post vacant.
The hours are easy at Balmoral
Castle. The ghost is expected to
appear upon turret at l1:45 pm.
nightly Except Sundays and bank
holidays) and walk the battlements
for half an hour. The rest of his
time is his own. The pay is good.
The prestige is colossal. Once
ghost gets the Balmoral Castle as
signment his fortune is made.
Lately, however, they tell me that
airplane bombings have given the
Job a certain hazard, an occupa-
tional risk. That would explain why
mysterious Al Hostak jumped the
moat at Balmoral and returned to
his native Seattle to haunt in COM
parative safety. I can't say I blame
him. A ghost has got to think of
his family and his future.
Druxmon No Phantom,
Jacobs Will Attest.
The stories about Hostak are con-
ficting. Some folks allege that he
walks in broad daylight, with a
raven on his shoulder, black cat
strolling ahead. and his sponsor,
Nate DruXman. bringing up the rear.
Others have seen him only at sun
set, still complete with Druxman.
who is real, so real that he has been
seen in the East, shaking his fist
in Mike Jacobs teeth hard enough
to make them rattle like castanets.
Mr.. DruXman was in the East to
watch Ken Overlin beat Ceferino
Garcia for the world middleweight
championship of New York, as op-
posed to the world middleweight
championship of Seattle.
Now that Garcia is out of the
picture" said Mr.. Druxman, "Over-
lin can make a fortune by coming
to Seattle to meet my phantom-I
mean my fighter"
"Overlin is not making no for
tunes fighting no ghosts" snapped
Mr.. Jacobs.
"Hostak is not ghost!" yelled
Mr.. DruXman, pulling an envelope
from his waistcoat pocket. II have
here a lock of his hair, which
proves"
"It don't prove nothing" said Mr..
Jacobs. Il suspect that hair was
taken from a rabbit, who probably
met with foul play"
Somebody separated the two peev-
ish promoters, and Mr.. DruXman
stalked off to Seattle, vowing that
Mr.. Jacobs would have to come to
him, not vice versa. This means
that the ghost of Seattle will haunt
that city exclusively until further
notice, to the great joy of the citi-
zenS, who like their ghost.
I like him, too, except for his
one unfortunate habit of demanding,
"Is there Lardner?" OF course
there's Lardner One more crack
like that and I will ask to see his
license. You have to have a license
to haunt city Of more than 100000
pop.