THE HAPPIEST WOMAN

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 221, 14 June 1930, Page 29

THE HAPPIEST WOMAN

AND THE CAUSE OF ALL IS—BOXING

Boxing is a woman’s game. If you are in doubt have a chat with Mrs. Dick Burge, the director of the famous Boxing Hing in Blackfriars, London, as I did (writes a “Sunday Chronicle” representative). For years Mrs. Burge has successfully run The Ring, where boxers get a try-out and where many a champion has been discovered.

Now after years of effort Mrs. Burge is the happiest woman in Britain for she is to achieve her life’s dream. The Ring is to be rebuilt as a National Home of Boxing at a cost,-it is estimated, of £150,000. And these boxers, some huge and burly, others light and agile, but all, nevertheless, fighters—are they difficult to inanage? Not a bit of it! The truth is that by dint of tact, diplomacy, and sound business management Mrs. Burge finds the ring no more difficult to run than a Sunday school; handling boxers—the big, bronzed babies! —is mere child’s play to her. “Boxing has always fascinated me,” said Mrs. Burge. “Some people might imagine that running a boxing ring is anything but a woman’s job, but my own case proves once again that women can fill quite as efficiently as men almost any post one can imagine. I firmly believe that running a boxing ring is a woman’s job.

“When, for instance, two boxers misunderstand each other; when, say, a boxer suspects a foul blow, where evidence to the contrary can be supplied by the referee and spectators, there is nothing like a woman for putting things'straight. That, of course, doesn’t often happen, for all boxers are good sports, more or less. “Boxing is a clean sport, apart from its possibilities as a career,” she said, “and so long as it is popular in England we can safely ignore the Jeremiahs who are constantly telling us that modern youth is corrupt, and that England is going- to the dogs.” ■ Now, after years of strenuous labour, one' of Mrs. Burge’s fondest dreams is to materialise. The venerable old hall, which she has grown to love, is to be demolished and replaced by a new and better ring. With its own swimming bath and clubrooms, and built on lines similar to those of the Albert Hall, .the new ring will provide for greatly increased accommodation.