A Visit in the Champ's House

A Visit to the Champ's House

BY JOHN FARNSWORTH LUND

THE JULY DAY BLISTERED EVERYTHING; the heat arose in waves; the street asphalt melted and crept like molasses. A good day for running through the lawn sprinklers or following the ice wagon. A good day for lengthy discussions on the sizes and shapes of girls, but best of all a day on which a guy does nothing. The telephone call changed all this.

The kids in the old Seventeenth Ward on First North and West Temple in Salt Lake City survived the First World War and were free of the grind of knitting washcloths for our soldiers overseas and eating every bite of food because children starved in Armenia. This was never fully explained, but it was in the line of "doing one's bit" and we accepted it. The question lingered. How could eating my oatmeal help a starving child thousands of miles away?

The Boy Scouts were assigned the task of helping the Relief Society gather donations to the war effort and to help the less fortunate in the ward. Jack Dempsey's mother was a heavy donator to the program, and on this day she telephoned the ward that she had a donation to be picked up. She said to bring a wagon. My cousin Zack Lund, Tom Margetts, Gene Duffin, Spencer Robbins, and Lowell and Willard Morris were among those who worked this detail.

With the first big money Jack Dempsey made at fighting, he bought his mother a bungalow on Center Street just north of the triangle separating North Main and Center. Salt Lake housed very few black people, but perhaps the largest concentration of blacks lived in frame houses on the triangle at North Main. Maybe fourteen or fifteen houses.

This was a day on which I was totally alone. Try as I might, I could not scare up any pals to help me with Mrs. Dempsey's donation. She said to bring a wagon, so I took the little red wagon belonging to my sisters. Mrs. Dempsey had eleven children, so there was always a crowd at her house. She laughed heartily when I appeared alone with the tiny wagon.

"I meant you should bring a wagon—with horses!" she shouted. "Some wagon!"

I thought she was small and dainty to be the mother of such a great fighter. I saw her side of the joke and laughed with her. I promised to do the best I could to get her offering to the ward. There were six sacks of potatoes, five gunny bags of onions, two crates of oranges, and other goodies such as celery, carrots, and lettuce.

Jack Dempsey had started boxing for Hardy K. Downing at his Hippodrome Theatre club on East Second South, just east of the Semloh Hotel on State Street. He began for five dollars a bout but was now receiving thousands of dollars for his fights and was being boosted as a contender for the heavyweight championship of the world. His real name was William Harrison Dempsey, named for our president. His first fights were as Willie Dempsey. The Jack came later. He was married but came often to his mother's house for her cooking and mothering.

He was never alone. Other boxers, reporters, and promoters hovered close. He seemed to be always talking business, and he scowled more often than he smiled. Fighting was his business and he wanted to be the best. Savage in the ring, and said to be suspicious and surly in his dealings, he was always approachable to a kid. He seemed to make time to joke and talk to kids, and he bought hundreds of newspapers at 25 or 50 cents each. He was also known as a soft touch for has-beens, and the much larger group of never-weres. He impressed me as a huge cat, ready to pounce, always ready to claw. I never could square his high-pitched, nervous voice with the rest of him. He always needed a shave due to his wiry, black stubble.

Jack's brothers, Bernie and Johnny, started fighting but were not successful. Jack possessed the speed, physique, and instincts of a great natural fighter. I heard his mother say he never wanted to be or attempted to be anything else. I, like so many other kids, tagged after him everywhere, from Joe Vincent's cafe and the Mint to the Tribune press room and the two or three gyms around town. I was in a group one day to hear him talk about fighting. He said a fighter would never go far without oversized hands and wrists. His hands were like hams.

Jack did not look muscular in a street suit because his muscles were not bulky. They were supple and elastic and carried the kick of a mule. He professed great respect for the lanky, raw-boned farm boys, for they were the courageous, murderous punchers. A picture I shall never forget is Jack sitting on his mother's back porch in an underwear shirt, his rugged face twisted in wrinkles and a bitter scowl, his eyes closed to slits against the smoke of a cigar. I don't think he ever smoked in public. It was also the only time I ever saw him alone.

I recognized one of Jack's visitors as Hardy K. Downing, who came to Utah as a bicycle racer at the original Salt Palace and stayed in Salt Lake to eventually promote boxing. Hardy K's photo was often on the sports pages, so he was easy to spot.

An old black touring car with glassine window flaps which could be wrapped around in case of a storm stood forlornly near. Bernie Dempsey had his arm in a sling from attempting to crank it. All cars had to be cranked, and some were temperamental and dangerous. The car had been there for two weeks.

A couple of fellows helped me load for my first trip. The wardhouse was downhill about three blocks away. I had trouble balancing the load so it would ride evenly, causing more trouble going down than if I were going up. On each trip I phoned around the neighborhood for help, but to no avail. After my second trip, Mrs. Dempsey had cold lemonade for me. After the fourth, with two or three more to go. Jack said, "That's enough kid. You can send for the rest of it next week. We're going to Saltair."

Somebody got up enough nerve to crank the old car, because it was gone in two or three days. The Scout troop picked up the rest of the donation.

Salt Lake did not see much of Jack Dempsey after he became champion. He moved his mother to a large house on the corner of Tenth East and South Temple and, later, to an estate in Murray.

I worked hard the day of my visit to the champ's house and will always remember it.

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