In those days, however, Rothstein's luck remained near-perfect. Relax, A. R. informed Benny. I never had a chance to place that bet.
Middleweight champion Harry "The Human Windmill" Greb was one of the dirtiest fighters ever. On the night of July 2, 1925, before a 40,000-fan Polo Grounds crowd, he defended his title against welterweight champ Mickey "The Toy Bulldog" Walker. His training camp featured as many dames as sparring partners-and Greb spent evenings enjoying himself in Manhattan's speakeasies. At 2:00 A.M. the night before the fight, A. R. and fellow gamblers Sam Boston and Mike Best loitered in front of Lindy's. A careening Yellow Cab pulled to a halt, and out fell drunken Harry Greb. Two chorus girls bounded out and packed Harry back in before the vehicle sped away.
Arnold Rothstein had sizable money on Mr. Greb, as did Boston and Best. Boston observed, "That bum don't have a chance. You can't drink and love all night and expect to lick a guy like Mickey Walker twenty-four hours later." Boston, Best, and Rothstein all determined to quickly hedge their bets by getting some cash down on Walker.
As Greb climbed into the ring, he looked considerably better. "Hey Harry, how do you feel?" yelled one writer. "Great," the middleweight champ responded. "How did those gamblers like my act last night?" Greb fought his usual dirty fight and could have been disqualified any number of times. But he wasn't and outpointed Walker in fourteen rounds. He remained middleweight champion of the world, had outsmarted the great Arnold Rothstein-and most likely profited immensely in the bargain.
It's unlikely that Greb staged his little burlesque merely for fun. Presumably, the champ and his friends had money down on him. But the odds weren't very good. After all, A. R. had money down on Harry. So did Boston and Best. So did a lot of people. But Greb's performance caused Rothstein, Boston, and Best-three of the city's smartest gamblers-to shift their money to Walker. When they did, others followed. The odds shifted. Greb and company moved in-and cleaned up.
In September 1925, Mickey Walker and Californian Dave Shade opposed each other at Yankee Stadium. Shade, like Greb, was a big, dirty fighter. Like Greb, he hammered Walker. Everyone in the stadium awarded the decision to Shade-except the judges. They gave it to "The Toy Bulldog." In the process, they enriched Arnold Rothstein. The next day's newspapers complained that A. R. won $60,000 on the refs' dubious judgment. Not true, corrected Arnold: he won $80,000.
Benny Leonard. Harry Greb. Mickey Walker. All had their following, but the biggest boxer of the Roaring Twenties, perhaps the biggest of all time-was former hobo and barroom fighter Jack Dempsey. The Manassa Mauler didn't defeat opponents, he demolished them-when he found ones willing to fight. When, in July 1919, the 6'1", 187-pound Dempsey took the title from 6'6", 245 pound Jess Willard, he slammed The Pottawatomie Giant to the canvas seven times in the first round alone, shattering his jaw, breaking two ribs, closing his eye, damaging the hearing in one ear, and knocking out four teeth. Jack Dempsey fought to do more than just win.
Dempsey defeated Luis "The Wild Bull of the Pampas" Firpo in a brutal 1923 slugfest, and then took life easy. He avoided fighting Harry Willis, made movies, traveled extensively in Europe (in the company of such ladies as Peggy Hopkins Joyce). In 1925 he married money-hungry Hollywood actress Estelle Taylor, and that union only increased his disinclination to fight.
In September 1926, Dempsey finally fought again, against Gene Tunney, an ex-Marine from the sidewalks of Greenwich Village but, nonetheless, a fellow possessing annoying intellectual pretensions. Tunney bragged of how much he adored Shakespeare. In training for his challenge to Dempsey, he ostentatiously revealed that he took time to read Samuel Butler's The Way of All Flesh. Tunney, never much of a puncher, was a wonderful scientific boxer, and promoter Tex Rickard booked a Dempsey-Tunney match for Philadelphia's Sesquicentennial Stadium. The hungry boxing public would have paid to see Dempsey fight the paunchy, middle-aged Rickard. To see Dempsey versus Tunney, 120,757 fans paid a $1.8 million gate. (The hot-ticket Willard fight had drawn just 20,000 fans and a $450,000 gate.)
Oddsmakers predicted Dempsey's easy victory. But on the morning of the fight, Dempsey bodyguard Mike Trent gave the champ a small glass of olive oil, a habit meant to aid digestion. Dempsey suffered something akin to food poisoning. On weigh-in, a pallid, wobbly champion was in no real shape to fight-particularly in the driving rainstorm that greeted both fighters at outdoor Sesquicentennial Stadium. Tunney easily took all ten rounds.
Writer Ring Lardner (who lost $500 on Dempsey) was among the many with suspicions. Damon Runyon didn't know what to think, but the whole setup bothered him. If there was a fix, it's unlikely Dempsey tanked voluntarily. He wasn't that kind of a fighter, that kind of a man. This we know. But we also know that Abe Attell and Arnold Rothstein were on the scene, among the handful of observers predicting a Tunney victory. A. R., prominent at ringside, won a fortune on the longshot, Tunney. Attell was everywhere.
Events are as notoriously hazy as the Black Sox scandal. Some say Attell acted in Philadelphia as Rothstein's agent. Some say Attell brokered the whole deal. Others say it all began when Tunney's manager, Billy Gibson, approached A. R. Billy Gibson was, of course, very used to transacting business with Arnold Rothstein.
Both versions agree on this: Just days before the fight, Gibson and Tunney signed away 20 percent of all of Tunney's future winnings to Philadelphia gang lord and sometime fight promoter Maxie "Boo Boo" Hoff. But the first version begins like this: Several days before the fight, Attell drove to Tunney's Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania training camp. After all, everybody knew the Little Champ, and no one outside organized baseball seemed to mind that he had once fixed a World Series.
The Little Champ had kept busy since escaping punishment. In 1921 he opened an opulent women's shoe store, the Ming Toy Bootery, next door to Broadway's Roseland Ballroom. The following May, a watchman felt a drop of something fall upon his hand. It was gasoline, oozing from a five-gallon can, surrounded by some oilsoaked newspapers, in the store's stairway. Abe claimed old enemies were attempting to "frame" him. "There is no reason I should set the store on fire," he explained. "We are making money, and the business is in good financial condition." The Ming Toy entered receivership that July. Later Abe moved into overt illegality, operating the Peacock Club, a West 48th Street speakeasy.
Attell shared more than a passing acquaintance with Tunney. They were close friends. In May 1923 Tunney lost to Harry Greb, his only defeat in sixty-eight pro bouts, absorbing a terrific beating and literally losing a quart of blood. Attell, watching from Tunney's corner, rushed to a nearby drugstore and returned with enough adrenaline chloride to staunch Tunney's bleeding. Grantland Rice, for one, always believed Attell saved Tunney's life. At Sesquicentennial Stadium against Dempsey, Abe Attell was at Billy Gibson's side before the fight-and in Tunney's dressing room afterward. It was Abe Attell who dressed the new champ before he went back out into the world.
But that's getting ahead of our story. When Attell visited Tunney's Stroudsburg training camp, Tunney and Gibson told him they needed to repay Tex Rickard $20,000 he had advanced for Tunney's training-but were flat broke. Kindly sort that he was, Attell approached Boo Boo Hoff for the cash (Gibson couldn't go to Hoff; he hadn't spoken to him for years after reneging on booking Benny Leonard at South Philadelphia's Shetzline Park). The day before the fight, Hoff provided $20,000 in exchange for 20 percent of Tunney's future earnings as champion.
Truth is often stranger than fiction, but this tale is stranger beyond any norm. Why wouldn't Rickard wait another day, after Tunney collected his purse, for his $20,000? Why did Gibson have to deal with Hoff? Why couldn't he approach an old friend like, say, Arnold Rothstein-rather than an old enemy like Hoff? And what about the loan's peculiar conditions: If Tunney lost, Hoff received his $20,000 backinterest free. If-and only if-Tunney won, Hoff received 20 percent of his earnings for the length of his championship. Hoff's $20,000 loan might return as much as $400,000. What did Hoff provide beside $20,000?
The other version
of events, directly involving Rothstein, makes little more sense-but hints at the real story, something far more sinister. One night at Lindy's, a worried Billy Gibson approached A. R. Gibson had heard that powerful interests would prevent a Tunney victory. Since very few people-except for Abe Attell-gave Tunney much chance, Gibson's comments were mystifying. Powerful interests wouldn't stop Tunney, Jack Dempsey's fists would.
A. R. asked who was responsible. Gibson responded vaguely: "I just got the word."
"I'll take care of it," Rothstein replied, calling Hoff the next day. All of A. R.'s worlds were small worlds. Rothstein and Hoff had done business in bootleg liquor in 1921. "Gibson's my pal," he told Boo Boo. "I want you to protect him."
"Tell him to see me," Hoff replied.
Gibson met Hoff in Philadelphia. On his return to New York, Billy informed A. R. "Boo Boo says it's all right. Can he make good?" Rothstein assured Gibson he could. Later Hoff told A. R., "I sent the word out. This is my territory and what I say goes. I'm betting Tunney." With that assurance Rothstein bet $125,000 on Tunney at four-to-one odds.
That translated into a $500,000 payoff.
A. R. wouldn't plunge $125,000 on anyone's say-so-unless Mr. Anyone had taken very positive and effective actions to affect the outcome. And that's what Jack Dempsey would soon allege. After fighting a controversial tune-up against Jack Sharkey, Dempsey signed for a Tunney rematch, but before lacing up his gloves the Manassa Mauler accused Hoff, Attell ("the tool of a big New York gambling clique"), and Gibson of having worked to rig the first fight.
Dempsey published an extraordinary open letter to Tunney in the Chicago Herald and Examiner, charging that on reaching Philadelphia he was told "there's something phony about this fight." He asked Tunney for:
a little explanation to the public and to me-about all the angles involved in that suit which ... Hoff fired at you [Hoff f and Tunney were already wrangling about the terms of their agreement].
I pressed the point and was told that some sort of deal had been made whereby somebody was going to steal my title for you: that when I went into the ring I didn't have a chance to win unless I knocked you out by hitting you on the top of the head-and that I might get disqualified even then.
I was told that somebody with some sort of political power-of power in boxing affairs in Philadelphia-was going to see to it that a referee and one of the judges would be there to assist you; that if we both were on our feet at the end of the tenth that I'd lose the decision; that if I hit you at any point lower than the top of your head and dropped you, that somebody would yell "foul!" in your behalf.
Dempsey continued, explaining how betting turned heavily in Tunney's favor-until Tommy Reilly, "a 100 percent square-shooter," was chosen to referee. Still, Jack wanted to know:
What was the meaning of the second conference you had with Abe Attell; what was the meaning of Gibson conferring with Attell; what was the meaning of Attell seeing Hoff in [sic] behalf of you both? And, finally, what was the meaning of the secret conference you and Gibson had with Hoff on the evening of fight day, after which the gamblers passed out the word, "Sink the ship on Tunney: he can't lose."
As the story comes to me, Attell went to see you in your camp at Stroudsburg. After a lengthy conference with you he raced back to Philadelphia with your pure and innocent manager, Billy Gibson. And then Attell hurried along and had a meeting with Hoff.
As I understand it, Hoff is something of a political power in Philadelphia. He is supposed to be a rather mighty figure in boxing affairs, and the old saying goes that "Whatever `Boo Boo' wants-well, that's what `Boo Boo' gets. "
Attell, the tool for the gambling clique; "Boo Boo" Hoff, the political and boxing power in Philadelphia; and Gibson, your manager, had various meetings, all secret. And then you arrived in Philadelphia for the next chapter in the story finds you in a meeting with Hoff and Gibson-one that lasted until about 6 on the fight night.
Since then I learned that some sort of written contract was entered into involving Hoff, Gibson and yourself. Stories about it differ considerably. But the document itself has been made public. It strikes me as a strange document-one that puzzles the public as it puzzles me, and it is one that I think should be explained.
The contract stated, in substance, that Gibson borrowed $20,000 from Hoff and that Gibson agreed to pay back the $20,000 and nothing else-if you did not win the fight. But it contains a peculiar clause to the effect that if you won the fight Gibson was to pay back Hoff the $20,000 and, as a sort of bonus or something like that, that you were to give Hoff 20 percent of all your earnings as champion. You signed as a party to the agreement.
Can't we all have a little explanation about this?
You knew that if you won the title it would be worth at least $1,000,000 to you. Why were you agreeable to paying Hoff approximately $200,000 bonus for a loan of $20,000? What could Hoff do to help you on to victory that would be worth $200,000?
I think that you did make some explanation to the public like this, as regards the agreement:
"Gibson needed $20,000 to put through some real estate deal in New York and borrowed $20,000 from Hoffthat's all there was to it."
It always has seemed to me very strange that Gibson, with your sanction would have to borrow $20,000 from Hoff on fight night and agree to give Hoff about $200,000 possible when it would have been a simple matter for you or Gibson to borrow the money from Tex Rickard without a bonus agreement.
Reporters at Tunney's Cedar Crest Country Club training camp, demanded answers. They got pure Tunney in response. "I will not dignify these charges with a denial," he sniffed. "I have more important things to do. I am currently reading Of Human Bondage and I am going to return promptly to Mr. Maugham's excellent work."
The press didn't care about Somerset Maugham. They asked again. "Utter trash," Tunney replied. "At best, a cheap appeal for public sympathy. I have asked my attorney, Mr. Dudley Field Malone, to review these false allegations to see if they are actionable."
Tunney finally did answer, issuing his own written statement. It didn't go much beyond his original responses:
An open letter to Jack Dempsey:
My Dear Dempsey:
Your open letter to me has been brought to my attention.
My reaction is to ignore it and its evident trash completely.
However, I cannot resist saying that I consider it a cheap appeal for public sympathy.
Do you think this is sportsmanlike?
Gene Tunney
P.S.-I might add that I wrote this letter myself.
In boxing fists beat words. After Dempsey and Tunney entered the ring in Chicago's massive Soldier Field, the public forgot any controversy surrounding their Philadelphia bout. And when Soldier Field produced the immortal "long count," fans lost all interest in the original fightand in what Messrs. Attell and Rothstein might have pulled off.
Dempsey possessed more energy than in their first fight, but Tunney easily maintained control for six rounds. In the seventh, Dempsey connected with a brutal left hook to the chin. As Tunney crumpled, Jack landed four more punches to his head. Referee Dave Barry (a late addition, replacing a Capone-favored referee) counted to "six" over Tunney, before noticing Dempsey hadn't retreated to a neutral corner as required by newly adopted Illinois Boxing Commission rules. Barry should have resumed counting at "seven." He began at "one." His infamous "long count" allowed the battered Tunney eighteen seconds before getting up from the canvas and kept him in the fight.
Something little noticed-but equally suspicious-happened in the next round. A refreshed Tunney landed a glancing blow that knocked the off-balance Dempsey to the canvas. The Manassa Mauler jumped to his feet at Barry's count of "one." But Barry shouldn't have been counting at all. Gene Tunney was not in a neutral corner.
Who, indeed, could remember what had happened in Philadelphia? That was all so tame.
Or so it appeared. Years later, Abe Attell confided details of the two Dempsey-Tunney fights to fam
ed "fight doctor" Ferdie Pachecho. He told of Hoff's interest in Tunney and of Capone's in Dempsey. The Chicago gangland boss loved Jack Dempsey. Scarface even reassured Jack he'd do whatever he could to assist the Manassa Mauler regain his title. Dempsey didn't want that kind of "help," and had the courage to tell him so. Capone backed down. Even Al Capone backed down from Jack Dempsey.
"In those days," Attell informed Pacheco, "the mob boys took over cities as their territories. The Italians had Chicago; the Jews had Philly and some parts of Detroit." Then Attell assumed the air of one revealing a great secret, that he was conveying what really happened in those two titanic fights: "What you had was this, Doc: It was the Italians against the Jews. The Jews won!"
Yes. One, in particular, took home $500,000.
A. R. knew more about boxing than he let on in court, and the boxing world knew quite a bit about him. In the fall of 1928 former New York American reporter Gene Fowler was doing publicity work for Tex Rickard. One day Rickard sat in his Madison Square Garden office, in a chair made of cattle horns, musing about the dangers of the stock market. Fowler wanted to know why he didn't get out.
"Because I'm a gambler, that's why," Rickard shot back. "I play percentages, but I'm not a sure-thing gambler, like Arnold Rothstein. That ain't gambling, and it ain't adventure. I'm the kind of a gambler who gambles, and don't look to a `fix' to win. You know something? Rothstein is going to get hisself killed."
Fowler asked if Tex had inside information.
"Yes and no," Rickard responded. "You don't need inside information down where I come from. A real gambler like me, a feller who likes it like some fellers love booze or women, and not just because it's a marked-card deal or a fix, well, we got hunches, and we play 'em. I knew all the time up in Alaska I'd never get shot. Me? I play percentage, but no fixing."
Rothstein: The Life, Times, and Murder of the Criminal Genius Who Fixed the 1919 World Series Page 26