The Wilmington morning star., 1947-12-05
AS Pegler Sees It
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
copyright, 1947, King Features
Syndicate Inc.l
Syndicate, Inc.)

noon about dusk, a little before five, I
was passing the Mirror building and three
mugs were blocking the entrance on the
sidewalk there, standing and talking, and
people couldn't get in or out.
Those things burn you and you would
think they would have the brains to nc not
block the way, so probably gave this little
guy a glare A little guy in yellow coat,
a little blue-jaw Broadway type in yellow
coat and the hat brim down on his shoul-
ders. He gave me glare back and then
he slet out a yell, "hey," | hollered Sam
my Taub," and it is s, what do you know!'
Whitey?"
In those days, you know, the old days,
Sammy was a shorthand man and sort of
secretary for Bat Masterson, the old
Dodge City marshal, or sheriff, who came
on to write fights for the Morning Tele-
graph in the carbarn across from where
Madison Square Garden is now. On the spot
where Dempsey had that big restaurant
on the southeast corner of Fiftieth and
Eighth avenue was the old Morning Tele-
graph and they say the plant really was
no-kidding barn in the horse car days
when the horsepower boarded in the stalls
at the back
| Long afterward, when Joe Moore bought
it and blew a chunk, there in the twenties.
Gene Fowler was the managing editor and
he used to draw deep breath and close
his eyes and say, "ah that old atmosphere,
just the right atmosphere for horse-pa-
! per."
leave it to Sammy Taub or Jim Nc
Guinness or Louella Parsons - she was
there, too, in those days-if it didn't still
have that Churchill Downs bouquet. Ed
Bradley used to say it was good for you
Got ammonia in it. Make you live long
time. Bradley hit "a.
Fowler had the Telegraph some years
after Bat Masterson and Rem Wolf and
Baird Leonard who did that beautiful verse
the giants. A girl, named Baird. I didn't
get to knowing her personally, but she
could write. That was no secret. McGraw
didn't like women around at all. Not With
the troupe on the road nor neither even in
the press coop, but this one could write
baseball in anybody's league and better
than most of the stays. Not one of your
chew-tobacco types, either. When Fowler
had the Morning Telegraph he hired all the
guys around town he figured should have
had a raise years ago. If old Ochs and Og-
gle Reid wouldn't raise deserving journal
lists, big-hearted Gene Fowler would, with
we'll washed by then and, anyway, if you
want to know, he never was much good in
newspapers. Magazines, yes. Wonderful.
But for daily, no.
But Fowler paid him three or six hun
dred week for three pieces. Lois Long,
lipstick was her pen-name then, did little
feature. Charlie Macarthur and Hecht
Gene. They used to tear off living human
documents, for free. One night there was
mushy spot in the season at the garden.
The main event was to be a couple of
muscle-bound middleweights, and Gene
decided to call it the battle of the aeon
and clown it up.
We didn't have any city editor. We didn't
even have any assignment book Just pick
your own story. Gene never knew what he
had for his paper until they dropped it on
his desk. One day everybody covered one
bum's training. Next day everybody cover
ed the other bum. Finally, Friday morning,
Gene ran big box listing the great lineup
gathered from the ends of the earth to
Macarthur, Hecht Jim Harrison Vidmer
and so forth. Then it said "and Gene Fow-
ler the greatest editor since Brisbane was
in his prime will tell our readers what
this contest means to posterity."
He liked to rib Brisbane by putting him
in the past tense. Il think A. B. fired him
once)
Sammy Taub somehow got mixed up with
Bat Masterson in Bats last days. The Lew
is boys, who owned the Telegraph then,
brought Bat on to Broadway because he
was famous as fearless frontier sheriff.
! think he must have been flaking off when
l used to see him little around the fight
business toward the end Of his career be-
cause they used to say he was such hell
Of a fight writer, but to me, frankly, he
had no class. Just abusive. To prove he
wasn't afraid OF anybody, he would not on
ly pick the toughest people in town to write
about but he would roll into an Irish res
| taurant, and most of the good ones
were Irish then, and call the waiter a
dumb, thick turkey. They just gentled him
along because he wasn't the old Bat Mas
terson any more. Not even an interesting
| character any more, but just an old, roar
ing pest, so they took lot from him that
| they wouldn't have taken from anybody
else.
From being Bats caddy, little Sammy
graduated into the Morning Telegraph's
fight man and, when they had room
enough, he could do you a story like
moving picture with those Arabian chicken
tracks of his.
Sammy used to say, II score fight YER
hind on the blow blow you cut across
lots how they exchanged furious volleys
OF let's and rights to the head and body"
Dundee was with him. Johnny, and Leach
Cross. with their noses flattened and their
lips. thick and deckled from old punches
against the teeth, and that overhanz of
scar tissue above the eyes. Leach said they
fought so and so many times and he never
hit little Johnny yet Sammy Taub would
know and have his notes to prove it.
He wrote copper-plate fights and broad
cast copper plate, too. The best fight broad
casts I ever heard On top all the time.
Never cut across lots
Dumb Dan. Morgan came up He saws he
is now in his second century but he still
spars and bobs and weaves, even sitting
down He could still give you the back Of
his hand. 00NN VI
It turned out they were going up to Kings