When Gene Had a Stone Bruise!

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 531, 7 December 1928, Page 11

When Gene Had a Stone Bruise!

What Books Have Done to l unney A WALKING DICTIONARY A lather amusing sidelight upon tli* cultural attainments of the exchampion heavy-weight and newlywedded Gene Tunney was contained in “Pardon My Glove,” the boxing conducted in the “Morning Worm,” New York, by Ilype Igoe, veteran fisticauthority. Giving Hyp© due credit, wc quote part of his article: “Bill Cunningham, a Boston writer, accuses Gene Tunney of trying to make a verbal home run every time lie opens his mouth. * “Of course, all of the war correspondents who have visited Gene at his camps in the past have been impressed with Gene’s vocabulary, but evidently Tunney knocked big Bill for a twister, so much so, in fact, that he has gcfie into print about it. Ho does and he doesn’t take Gene to task under the title ‘What Books Have Done For — and To —Tunney.’ “Early in June, Cunningham, with three friends, had motored to Speculator, more intent upon trout at the moment than upon Tunney. TRAINING FOR HEENEY “The champion had just established camp to start training for his coming contest with lleeney. The war correspondents had yet to arrive,” writes Cunningham, “for pugilistic news at the moment was negative.” “We were sitting on the verandah of the little inn after breakfast. when Tunney learned of our presence, and came over to greet us. He did this quite pleasantly, and sat down o. the steps for what had ail the earn-arks o'

formal chat. I hadn't seen him since the previous December, at which time w© had taken a trip together, so naturally and even innocently enough I inquired, ‘Well, how are you, and how ve things been going?’ And mav the Lord make all my children be lefthanded third basemen if this isn’t almost verbatim his answer: “TRAUMATIC PERIOSTITIS” ‘Quite splendidly, generally speaking, thank you, only I had the misfortune some while back to sustain a traumatic periostitis. Of course, it wasn’t a malignant periostitis such as commonly afflicted Harry Wills, if you recall. Just a traumatic periostitis, which, however, is clearing up satisfactorily. I have really been very fortunate during my -career. I have suffered one or two minor metacarpal fractures, to be sure, and I once sustained a greenstick fracture of the right thumb, but it was a clean greenstick fracture that healed without complications. On the whole, things have progressed quite satisfactorily, thank you. And how are your own affairs?’ “As soon as I could discover a dictionary big enough, I found that traumatic periostitis is merely the hardest way of saying ‘stone bruise.* ” “If,” concludes Cunningham, “you can P’cture an answer given in response to a commonplace question propounded on the verandah of a three-dollar boardinghouse, to an assemblage composed of three casuals and a reporter who knows him well enough to call him ‘Gene,’ you will have some idea of what hooks have done, not for, but TO. Gene Tunney.”