Monday, Dec. 22, 1930

Cheese v. Chocolate

Cheese v. Chocolate

With a rubber bandage around one knee, flat-nosed, beetle-browed Battling Battalino of Hartford, Conn., featherweight champion of the world, advanced crouching in Madison Square Garden toward Kid Chocolate (Eligio Sardinias), flashy Cuban Negro. With an eye for an evening's entertainment and the support of the Italian vote at the next election. Governor John Trumbull of Connecticut was at the ringside rooting for Battalino and so was Mayor Walter Batterson of Hartford. Wild and scared in the first round, feeling the hostility of the crowd which had called him "cheese champion" because he kept his title safe by fighting only at catchweights, Battalino ran into one of Chocolate's short, clean punches, went down for a count of eight, tottered when he arose, apparently hopelessly beaten. But he lasted out the round, was stronger in the next, soon began to pile up points, crowding Chocolate all the time, whipping clumsy but effective hooks to the blackamoor's kinky head and antlike thorax. After 15 rounds of it, referee and judges agreed that "cheese champion" was a real champion but the crowd, liking Chocolate's style, booed, tore up programs.

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