The Anaconda Standard from Anaconda, Montana • 40

1 THE ANACONDA STANDARD: SUNDAY MORNING, FEBRUARY 27, 1916. 1- WHO GETS THE MOST FUN OUT OF GOLF? 1 ir GOTCH WELL AWARE OF MENACE TO CROWN PlLtti rwHATTYA Seventy, 5xr) Vlp vru-i- a MtiDRGT sevenTr Uo STRAIN ON BOWLERS IN 300 GAME never realize when they have gone away for good until it is too late. The wrestling title ought to be' in Dodge, by the end of the year, at least. It's a curious thing about that little town of Dodge that it has produced two other notable figures in the wrestling wprld besides Stecher. One was Clarence Whistler, who had renown long and long ago, and the other was the original "Strangler" Lewis not the "Strangler" who has been wrestling in the tournament at the Manhattan opera house, but Evan Lewis.

Evan was regarded as quite a tussler in his time. Not Really Retired. Gotch has Veally never been in complete retirement, as many people seem to think. He wrestled no longer ago than July 4 last, when he took on St. Lx)uis, Feb7y 26.

Discussing a regular epidemic of 300 scores on the alleys here, the Times eives a vivid. study of the sensations that assail the) pin smasner wniie maKing xz siraignt strikes. Bowling a perfect game is an ex-, tremely difficult proposition, says the Times, and is not a matter of "grooves" in an alley as much as it la accurate placing of the 16-pound ball and the steadiness of the nerves. From facts gathered the following will explain just how it feels to roll 300: When a bowler starts a game with three strikes he thinks nothing of it. When the fourth and fifth strikes are made, visions of a big game commence to play tag with his brains.

The sixth and seventh are made, and the big game develops into a possible perfect game. Watch a bowler when he has six or seven strikes. He'll sit down probably once 'out of 10; either that or he comj mences to use the towel as if it were a razor strop and his thumb was the razor. -Be grins to Feel Strain. He picks up the ball, ready for the eighth strike.

He fingers it carefully, tests the grip, and in nearly every instance puts his thumb in the wrong hole. After getting into position he will take much time before starting to the line. He delivers, watches the baa and, it it's going into the "pocket," he will either step back suddenly and punch imaginary holes in the air or run sideways across the approaches to the right. He gets the eighth strike and smiles broadly. In getting the ninth strike he will go through the same contortions, but with a greater amount of speed and energy.

In the tenth frame the howler feels a peculiar sensation in the knes and an awrui dryness in the throat. He 0 TELLS HISTORY OF New Feb. 26. Frank Gdtch, one of the very few survivors of the old guard of American cham- j-ions ol i.he past decade, is at last confronted by a very formidable 'pretender to the wrestling throne. Out of the Middle West that produced the Iowa Avalanche has come Stecher, the Scissors Grinder, who today is all that Gotch was Just a few short years ago young, powerful, ambitious and apparently invincible.

It is. almost inevitable that the youth- ful furrow follower from the corn, husker country will eventually grapple with Gotch for the American mat title, and men who follow the wrestling game closely believe that when they meet the star of the catch-as-cateh-can empire, which has so long shone down on the town of Humboldt, Iowa, will shift its illuminating beams to the little burg of Dodge, Neb. In other words, they believe that Stecher will beat Gotch not as easily as Joe scissored the "Masked Marvel" into submission at Madison Square Garden the other evening, but Just as surely. They believe that a new cham- pion is in the making, if he is not already made, and Just awaiting the for. mal transfer of the title.

Great was Gotch, but greater still is this long, lithe, snaky youth from old Nebraska, say the wrestling sharks, and they do not believe that the man from the Hawkeye state will ever be able to get far enough along the road of Comebackville to give Siecher.much of a tussle. A few years ago Gotch might have but then a few years ago is a lot of years ago in the world of sport. Ball players, boxers, wrestlers they are all about the same. The professional life of a wrestler is longer, as a rule, than other athletes, but old boy Time eventually gathers them in with the rest. Goch Fully Aware.

Gotch is not deceiving himself about this new woncter, as old champions are-apt to do when some.young chap begins casting a shadow across the championship trail. Months ago, when Stecher was first attracting a little attention out West by his feats, Gotch was in Chicago, and during a conversation with a party of friends the Ne-braskan's came up- Gotch had never seen Stecher at that time, and asked a number of questions about him. "Aw, he's a big stiff, Frank," said a member of the group, by way of getting himself in right with the champion. "He's Just a big, awkward stiff. Ton can beatvhim easy." "Yes," replied Gotch dryly, "that's what they said about me when I Started out, too.

They said I was Just a big, awkward stiff. Any one who can beat the men this fellow has, in the way he has. Is no' stiff. You can go broke on that proposition." And that Gotch foresees the day when he will be called upon to defend his title against the long-legged Nebraska boy is shown by the fact that he has taken up active training. Frank has signed with a circus for a tour of several Meant'me- he is at Rowardennan, Jim Jeffries old training camj in California, getting ready.

Gotch will meet all comers on the tour, offering $100 to any man who lasts 15 minutes with him, and this should give him some of the real mat-mauling that, after irll, is the only preparatory work worth two whoops. Stecher the Favorite. A fighter should fight to keep In condition. Boxing bouts do him little good. A ball player can keep in physical-form in Just one way, and that is by playing baseball constantly.

By the same token, a wrestler must keep wrestling to attain and maintain the old pink. Along in May, if he thinks he is just right, it is said that Gotch will announce himself ready to sign with Stecher. It is a cinch he will think he is just right, too, for the old boys Coyprlght, Underwood Underwood. JOB STECHER. illillilftik is iorcea to rest longer than he Intends to.

Once more he picks up. the ball, walks slowly to his position, wriggles his body, pats the ball rubs off a little dust, stops, hesitates a long while before going, starts, delivers the ball and watches with both eyes glued on the pins, not the ball. The plna disappear for the tenth strike. Now is when the heart starts a Marathon, and it surely goes. It feels as if it were wandering all around the chest and pounding.

It's the roll-off. He must get that eleventh strike. 11 picks up the ball, holds it with the left hand, tries to wreck the towel rack, then walks to his position as if rehumatism had suddenly attacked him. The strain is intense at this time. Beads of perspiration drop from his forehead in Niagara fashion.

His footwork is unsteady, and he does not seem to be able to get the position he did when he only had three strikes. He stoops, jumps up, stoops again, then creeps very slowly up to the line, nearly dropping the ball on the way. In delivering the ball he does but one thing that is, trust to luck; and luck favors him with his eleventh strike. This, however, la not near aa perfect as some of the rest. Ljok at him when he turns around.

His face is haggard, and the best Joke in the world could not make him smile. Now for the last strike. This time ha does not use the towel or look at MS finger; but it takes five minutes before he bowls. The ball is rubbed with" the palms of the hands. He poses, then steps as slow as an octogenarian, but In delivering he lofts the ball.

Again luck is with him; the ball rolls to the head pin, and after a blink or two of the eyes he finds he made the twelfth strike and a perfect game. After he- Is through he pays, but comes back the next day and listens to what the con versatlons are about. That is the joy of bowling 300. WILL HAVE ANOTHER CHAWCE. The home-run angle at the Poll grounds that afforded Frank Baker three world's series circuit drives will give him 77 golden opportunities the coming season.

The seats in the right field stadium always was a fond spot for the "home run" king, and it mattered not left-handers were victims as well as right-handers. For about two years Baker enjoyed 11 annual glimpses of the scenery at Coogan's Bluff against the Yanks. Seventy-seven appearances the coming season may result In another major league home run record. Cravath holds the 15-year honors with 22 last, season. Pittsburg Gazette-Times.

THEIR CLUBS x4 first new prospects I sounded. They joined heartily in the project, though they asked me not to use their names until I had gone further in the development of the scheme. I wished them to feel out the public pulse before they plunged by utilizing Comiskey's old park, which could have been rented for J14.000 a year. They finally decided to have a modern plant of their own on the north side. Instead of a first year cost of $50,000 to $75,000 they were In for $412,000 before they knew it.

Charlie Herrmann, head of Chapin Gore, who is associated with me in the wholesale stationery business in this city, is a great friend of Ban Johnson. He came to, me when he heard I was mixed up in outlaw baseball. he said, 'you're a nut. For the love of Mike pull out. You haven't a chance in a "Four months later when the Chicago team opened its new park he slapped me on the back.

'Jim, old said he, 'I'll have to hand it to you. I don't know how you did it. But you "The major league Idea embraced an eight club circuit, of course. Kansas City had succeeded Covington already. But Cleveland dropped.

That meant the task of interesting three other cities. Of course' I desired that these be situated in the East to provide an intersectional flavor. Ed Hanloh. helped me line up the Baltimore people. Dick Carrol interested friends in Buffalo.

"About this time," continued Gilmore, quite by chance I met Robert B. Ward. I was in Toronto about to close for a site on King street on which I held, an option. This was in the first week of February, 1914. The Toronto people had pledged $125,000.

At the King Edward hotel in Toronto I met a Chicago friend, Harry Herrinden. 'Nix on said he when he had learned the purpose of my visit. 'I'll put you up against a live Ho introduced me to Robert B. Ward. On Lincoln's birthday Mr.

Ward had cast in lot with. us. was not satisfied with financial Ordeman in his home town of Humboldt, and won in two falls. This partook of the nature of an exhibition, however, as Gotch appeared Just to help the fair association of Humboldt out of debt. A couple of years ago Gotch wrestled George Lurich in Kansas City, so he has not been entirely out of touch with the mat game.

He has been regarded as the title holder since about 1907. Another popular supposition is that his notorious match with Hacken-schmidt In Chicago killed the wrestling game in that town, but a year afterward Gotch met Jim Esson of Scotland there. Gotch is now almost 38 years old. He was born in Humboldt April 27, 1878. Stecher 'is only about 23, and while he may not weigh quite as much as Gotch, he is taller and is believed to be fully as strong now as Gotch was when at his best.

He may lack Frank's experience, but he has met men fully as experienced, even though they may not have been as good as the Humboldt Hurricane. Some wrestling experts profess the belief that the man who would cause Stecher more' trouble than any other mat worker in the world is Stanislaus Zbyszko. They declare that the Pole is so big Stecher would be unable to get his legs around him, thus losing the advantage of the scissors hold. When this idea was suggested to one of the Nebraskan's close followers, he' laughed. 'joe has been able to get his legs around bigger men than Zbyszko," he said, "and if they ever meet the Pole will riot bother him in the least because of his size." STECHER WILL STICK TO HTS OWN NEAT GAME The question of whether or not Joe Stecher, who is to wrestle in Butte on March 3, can throw Alexander Aberg at, Graeco-Roman style has opened up a debate as to the wisdom of a catch- as-catch can style wrestler taking cnances at a game he knows little about.

btecner is pre-eminently a leg wrestler. His fame on the mat has been built around the gripping, grind ing, crushing body scissors. The chances are he would lose to Aberg Dy tne disqualification route. When In tight place, his first thought would be of the body scissors with which he has won most of his matches. Stecher would coil about his opponent a few times, be warned and finally probably lose the match for failure to comply with the Graeco-Roman rules.

Frank Gotch once bumped into a great Graeco-Roman wrestler in Montreal named Pietro. The world's champion failed to throw his opponent and the bout was finally stopped by the police. Gotch was once defeated at Graeco-Roman, and the experience taught him a valuable lesson namely, to stick to the catch-as-catch can style. Aberg challenged Stecher recently. Stecher, profiting from the experi- i ence of Gotch, replied to his chalfenger as follows: "I wrestle catch-as-catch-can onlv.

I have no right to meddle in a trame of wnicn i know nothing. It would not i be fair to myself: it. would not be fair to my friends; it would not be fair to i the public. "I do not know whether or not Aberg could dispose of me so easily as he thinks, even at the Graeco-Roman style. I am sure he could not beat me at catch-as-catch-can.

Any time I Aberg -is willing to wrestle me in the latter fashion I shall be more than eager to. accommodate him. Out in my country I am sure that the pro- moters would hang up a guarantee for him that would make it worth his while to train. As to betting, he and his backers would be accommodated to any limit they might care to go. "I do not dispute Aberg's claimsto distinction in the Graeco-Roman art.

But, I understand that he is almost as proficient at catch-as-catch-can. Any i time he cares to talk along the latter strain he will find in me a ready listener." WAS WISHED ON HIM. "How did you ever get the name of Leach Cross?" the popular fighter who bears that moniker was asked here yesterday, "It was wished on me," replied Leach, who in private life is Dr. Louis Wallach, a dentist and family man of New -York. "When I was a little fellow my playmates calling me Laich, which is short for a long Jewish name.

In time all the members of my family got to calling me Laich instead of Louis or Louie. "My first bout was at- a club where the Irish had the bulge in numbers about five to one over any other nationality. I didn't think it good policy to fight under my right name', so decided I would.be Laich Cross. "When the announcer asked me my name I was so scared all I could do was mumble 'Cross, Cross, "'Yes, sir, Laich I replied. "He shook me by the shoulder and said: 'Cross what; ain't you got another "The fellow didn't understand me very well I guess I was so scared I couldn't talk straight so he announced me as Leach Cross, and I've been that to this day.

My wife how calls me Leach, and three of my brothers, who have been or are fighters, took the name of Cross when they became boxers. Dave and Phil have quit the ring now and are trav eling salesmen. Monte is going to make a corking good welter weight. He carries an awful kick in his right hand, and rapidly is learning how to make the best use of It" Cincinnati Enquirer. OUTLAWS conditions in Pittsburg and Nintimated as much to Mr.

Ward. 'I'll fix that quick he said. He wired Edward Gwinner to leave immediately for New York. Within an: iour after I met him Mr. Gwinner had closed for the Pittsburg club.

"That fixed our circuit nicely for the first year. And let me tell you that at the end of that first year I was still convinced that there was not only room but need for a third major league. We realized our mistake shortly after we started the second and farewell campaign. The expected increase in interest failed to materialize. Rather it dwindled.

Sinclair "Wadea In. "I was in Cincinnati on the Bill Kil-Iifer case in the spring of 1915 with John M. Ward. John told me he had heard that Pat Powers had a friend who had made a fortune in the western oil fields who had been trying to break into baseball. That was Harry F.

Sinclair. "Sinclair was an enthusiast from the start. When I first met him he mentioned the fact that he knew Phil Ball. Of course I was anxious to get a line on Harry, so I wired Ball as to his financial standing. 'All right.1 Ball wired back.

'Rockefeller has half the money in the world; Sinclair the other "But Sinclair hadn't been sleeping all this time. He wired Ball: 'How does baseball look to 'Come in and get your feet was Ball's answering telegram." Gilmore admits that the Federal league realized early last season that it could not hope to win. 'If you think we can Robert B. Ward told me one day, 'I will put up another I told him the best I thought we could get out of it was whatever mercy organized baseball could be bluffed into granting. The unfortunate death of Robert B.

Ward did not affect the final situation. Doubtless with him we might have exacted more reasonable terms. But no one could have avoided the inevitable. There was no room for three major leagues." 1 GILMORE New York, Feb; 26. Just plain Jim Gilmore now! It used to be Fighting Jim, but the handle broke off short when the Federal league surrendered to organized baseball.

A quiet mannered, 'quiet voiced chap, this quondam chieftain of outlaw ball. But any one who mistakes his apparent modesty for lack of self-assurance has another guess coming, writes W. J. McBeth in the Sun. James A.

Gilmore is a suave but forceful talker, a man of resource as well as of force. He holds the golden key to life, the recipe of success. -'He knows how to cement acquaintance into friendship; how to retain friendship through common adversity. And he possesses that mark of true genius which enables the favored of the gods to turn defeat into victory. Gilmore will go down as the Nap.ileen of baseball history.

He met his Water loo, but met it after he had shaken his world to the very foundations. He went down with the respect and esteem of those colleagues whose fortunes had been impaired by Gilmore's mad scheme of baseball ambition. Those game men, whom he cajoled and exhorted so recklessly to assault the impregnable monetary intrenchments of organized baseball, are his best friends today. They laugh now at their former folly. But in Gilmore they see only a friend whose misguided fancy led them off the paths of sound business sense, yet one who stood ready to sacrifice himself when' a chance of atonement presented itself.

Real Medicine Man. Toward the close of the 1915 baseball season the writer sat through a game at Washington park with the late Robert B. Ward and James A. Gilmore. Fighting Jim had just finished a long harangue of the possibilities of a new lighting system, for which Mr.

Ward had paid 116,000, revolutionizing the great summer game. "Jim, there, is better than medicine," said the president of the Tip-Tops. "No matter how blue I may -be he can roll the clouds away. "Gilmore," he continued in a chafing tone, "could take your bank roll out of your pocket and argue you into the belief that he had done you a great service. I like his exuberance; I love his enthusiasm.

He is straight as a die. I would back him with any part of anything I possess." That description fits the case. In his promotion of. the Federal league James A. Gilmore made a business mistake.

Yet he is man enough to admit tne fact frankly. one more than he regretted the financial losses of the men he interested in his revolutionary plans. His sincerity of purpose 'is best at tested' by the fact that his late asso ciates in outlaw balL enabled hlnv. to engage in business in this city; a business more fitted to his powers of imaginat'pn than the uplift of the baseball slaves. "I' should be extremely sorry," said Gilmore yesterday, "if I thought baseball weuld be permanently injured by the recent war." No one loves the game more than I.

No one is more solicitous for its general welfare and Its continued growth in popularity with the public. "I comfort myself that "indirectly I have been'' the humble means of lm proving baseball's future. Our fight has put npw life and strength into organized baseball. The old game had run down some. It needed stimulus.

It needed new blood. It needed men like Colonel Ruppert, Captain Huston, Charlie Phil Ball and Percy Haughton. The oUJ crowd that controlled the game were Just a bit too sordid. There were men in the game who had no business there, cer tain undesirables who threatened good name. These the fight has eliminated.

"Everything combines to arouse the interest of the New faces are coming from the Federal league," said he. "The public already has begun to speculate on the possibility of outlaw stars, unknown in fast company, upholding their end with the long established heroes of the National and American leagues. A wonder'ul distribution of the surplus talent been effected. The prospective campaign will open with the best balanced fields imaginable. For the next few years to come no individual team will have a walkover." Gilmore confesses to two great thought there was plenty of room for three major leagues," said he.

"I admit I had the wrong perspective. I judged from apparent conditions in Chicago. There was the North a city in itself, without" baseball. Now I am convinced I allowed myself to be woefully mistaken. I thought the baseball player a much-abused chattel.

I did not know the soul of the diamond athelte then. ''There is, no room for major leagues. There is no public demand for more than 1 two. Take it from me, there will never be room for more tian two first-class circuits. And no pity need be wasted on the downtrodden player.

The reserve clause of the playingr contract, to which I objected, is vitally important to clean promotion of the sport. It might not be if the moral sense of some players and (I regret to sayi It) some magnates were more highly developed. But in this age of commercial competition baseball could not live a year without the pro tection of the mooted clause. Otherwise players would not be placed on their own responsibility. Many of the stars of both the major and Federal leagues proved conclusively last season that a player protected by an lron-ciaa contract loses all interest in the primit ive instinct self-preservation.

"How I fell I cannot figure yet," said Gilmore. "But I wouldn't trade the experience for a fortuneT That surely was the life. "Why, the first year I traveled 000 miles. I had to break into several fortunes with a conversational jimmy. "It came about in August, 1913.

I was on my way to the Chicago Golf club for a tilt with Eugene R. Pike, now comptroller In his corrt-pany was E. C. Racey, then treasurer of the Chicago club of the Federal league. The circuit was composed of Covington, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Chicago, St.

Louis and Pittsburg. They had just about decided to switch the Covington franchise1 to Kansas City. "Now at this time my baseball experience was limited in the extreme. 1 was a fan of White Sox convictions. Like most fans I considered myself wise in the game.

That day for the first time I learned of the Federal league. "Racey was full of it; simply bubbling over. The Chicago team played its games on Du Paul academy campus, a little cigar box of a place. The1 right field fence was only 165 feet back of first That Chicago management had fallen on lean and hun gry days. The players hadn't been paid for weeks.

The league was staring into the face of bankruptcy, for it depended upon Chicago for whatever little publicity it did get. "The Pittsburg team was in W. C. McCullough of the visitors, with E. R.

Pike, collared three days later at the Chicago C. and just simply talked me blind. The upshot was that I assured them I would be a flier. Without his knowledge or consent, I declared Charlie Williams in with me- Wre assumed' liabilities with Pike -and A. Moran.

There were 22 games remaining on our schedule," Gilmore with a grin. "They cost Williams and myself just $14,000. "I went into league with the assurance that I was to take charge. John T. Powers, the president was not progressive enough to suit.

my notions. He seemed to avoid rather than to seek publicity. But it took me 14 hours at a meeting in Louis to convince the stockholders of the various clubs of the wisdom of making a change. "From, the start I had nursed the idea of a third major league. Just recollect the dinky, little circuit to which I fell heir and you will realize vaguely the task that confronted me.

A major league meant first of all a major territory, the best cities of the East and Middle WesU I realized that we could not at once expand into the well tor-tified major cities, so planned a scheme for gradual development. The -various moves we made are known to every follower of the game. "Weeghman -and Walker were the THESE SLUGGERS' BATS SH9ULD HELP llll, WITH LEE MAGEE AND FRANK BAKER LINED UP WITH THE YANKS AND WITH "BENNY" KAUFF WITH THE GIANTS, THE PROSPECTS' OF THESE TWO TEAMS LOOK BRIGHT FOR THE COMING CAMPAIGN. THESE THREE PLAYERS HAVE DISPERSED THE GLOOM CLOUDS, AND WELL, IT LOOKS LIKE A BIG SEASON FOR THE NEW YORK i ft.