FIGHTERS I HAVE SECONDED.

NZ Truth, Issue 98, 4 May 1907, Page 6

FIGHTERS I HAVE SECONDED.

i®t (By Spider Kelly.)!

Dal. Hawkins.

The races ,have put many a good mail on the 'bum, and among them hive been some fighters. Dal Hawkins might be fighting for some of them purses up m Nevada now but for the "ponies. He would rather play the horses than -train, so that is the reason you don't hear of him any more. Hawkins was one of the great lightweights of. his time, and there were some big fellows fighting Ihuii. A lig'.uv eight, to become pronv.nei.t m the days of Lavigne, . McFadden. Erne, O'Brien, Daly, McPartland, Everhardt, G-ans, and men like that, must have been good. Scrubs could make no progress against a bunch like that, and yet Hawkins figured m this class. I was behind Dal m a lot of his fights, and we were fast friends. He always wanted me to second him, no- matter where or whom he was fighting. We met m Arizona way back m the 80 s. He was a youngster, and doing a little fi-Rhtinvj. We drifted to San Francisco, ami m 1893 Dan killed Door Barney Miller. The . fatal blow ; was a left hook, which he was famous for. No middleweight has as hard a left punch as Dal. ..Whenever he put it over Ms seconds could grab the water . buckets and--scramble out of the ring, for/ the fight was over. The fighters were all scared of Dai's left.Whenever he was fighting you could hear the seconds on the other , side yelling : "Look out for the left— be careful o? tlh'ait left." Occasionally Hkwkins would' cross them, and send his right over. He did this on Frank Erne, and nearly g-na'hibed the coin. I think 'it was m the seventh round that Dal put Erne" down, and Ii thought it was curtains. But Frank pulled, himself together, and finally beat Dal. It may not be generally known, but Hawkins was indirectly responsible for Jack Welsh .being a referee. I might say that Hawkins and I put Welch m the business, and it happened m this way. At the time Dal was matched to fight George Dixon. Tom O'Rourke wanted Hiram Cook to referee. Cook and O'Rourlre were tod friendly to please me, and i advised Hawkins against accepting him. I really think now that Cook would have given Dal an even break, but I was young then, and, more suspicious than I am now, and stood . out against Cook. I told O'Rourke that I ! would agree upon young Mitchell, j Kitchen, PhilVWand. or Bob McAri ihur ; but O'Rourke would have none of these. Then I finally said *to him that I would 1 take Welch, who was his bosom friend. Tom accepted, and that was how Jack got his start as a referee, i I : was never sorry that I accepted, for it put a good referee m the game, though I must say that I didn't approve of the decisipn in' his first fight.. He called the 7)ixonHawkin.s fight a draw, ; when T thought Dal won, but that don't; matter. Tire best of us are liable to be wrong any time. Jack is a good referee all the same. • '■'*• * * Dal did something few fighters ha^e done— 'lie made two fights with the same man m two days. Californians will recall the time he fought Freddie Bogan those, two hard battles. By , the way, Eddie . Graney refereed them before the "Old. Calif ornian Club. I think the first fight weh,t sqmething like 80 'rounds, and it' got so late that Graney told .the fighters to come back tha next highland finish their jobs: Dal hurt his right hand, and, m order to put in 'an appearance the second night, we had to cocaine it. Bogan won the contest, which was one of the hardest fought battles m the history of the ring. This reminds me of the fight Dal had with Tod Sloan's valet. It was more of a burlesque • than a fight. Tod thought his valet icould fight the world. I presume he saw his valet box with some fighter, and Tod got it, m his head that he could beat a champion. Dal was going to the races every day and^he used to jolly Tod- about his valet. It finally led to a match between Hawkins and the valn't. We had a lot of fun with Tod before the fight. We >seht fellows to him telling him; that Dal was going to lay .down, and stuff like that. I forgot how big a side bet we got out of Tod, but I think it was 500 dollars. Old Jimmy Oagan went behind the valet, and all he did was to tell the poor fellow to keep a lookout for Hawkin's left. He lost his voice yellin.o-. "Look out for that left." But Dal just walked up and crossed him with a righV and Tod mid us off. It was soft money to take, I always wanted Hawkins to fight Lavienie, but we could never get the match. I will never think that the Kid .wanted to fight Hawkins. I migbu nave been wrong, but I would have bet my money on Hawkins. Any fighter who rushed Dal he would hit, and if he hit 'them he dropped them, and Lavigne was a rusher from way back. • « • Dal was a . very popular fighter and deservedly so, for he was a. gentleman, and was free with his money— too free, if anything. Gambling wa c a mania with him, and try as hard as I could to keep him away, he would sneak away to ths races. He would neglect his training to have a bet down on some 'skate and this is why he never got a chance to fight for big money. '