Glovers

Except for world-championship fights, amateur boxing draws larger crowds than professional boxing in the U. S. Current popularity of amateur matches focuses largely on the Golden Gloves tournaments, originated in 1927 by the New York Daily News and joined by its cousin, the Chicago Tribune, the following year.

Started as a circulation stunt, the Golden Gloves boosted not only the number of News readers but the standard of amateur boxing as well. By dividing all the fighters who had the desire and the necessary 25-c- to become amateur boxers into two classes (sub-novice and open), the Daily News Athletic Association did away with the common practice of matching tough but inexperienced youngsters with ring-wise opponents according to the luck of the draw. Today, almost every city in the U. S. has its Golden Gloves tournament, which stretches over a six-week period from the first neighborhood preliminaries to the city finals.

Last week, a crowd of 22,234--more than twice as many as turned out to see World Champion Joe Louis defend his title against Harry Thomas last month-- trooped into the Chicago Stadium. What they had come to see were the international matches between the Chicago Golden Glovers (who defeated the New York Golden Glovers in the annual inter-city championships two months ago) and a picked team of European amateurs. The Chicago team of eight (topnotchers in each of the eight divisions of pugilism) were the survivors of 23,000 aspirants from 26 midwestern and southern States who entered the first preliminaries four months before. The Europeans (four Germans, one Italian, Pole, Irishman and Finn) were the cream of the continent. They had two Olympic champions: Heavyweight Herbert Runge of Germany and Bantamweight Ulderico Sergo of Italy.

Sergo, a factory worker in his native Fiume, was the boxer the crowd had come chiefly to see. No. 1 amateur bantamweight of the world, his reputation of being invincible was backed up by over 100 victories in European matches in the last three years. Under Italy's Federazione Pugilistica, Sergo, like most Fascist fighters, had received top-notch instruction, had the benefit of year-round competition, including performances all over Europe, where amateur boxing is even more popular than it is in the U. S. Chicago fans, remembering well the drubbing he gave their favorite, Frank Kainrath, in the international bouts last year, were hoping against hope that they would see the tables reversed this year when he faced Kainrath again.

Underdog Kainrath, Chicago team captain and a violinist in his spare time, did not let his townsmen down. With grim determination, he made the bantamweight match the most exciting of the evening. Ducking Sergo's wild swings and peppering him with well-timed punches and counterpunches, Chicago's Kainrath clearly won all three rounds.

Most impressive European turned out to be a tall Pole named Antoni Kolczynski, 20-year-old Warsaw welterweight, who knocked down the idol of Chicago, A. A. U. and Golden Gloves Champion Jimmy O'Malley, so many times in the first round that the referee stopped the match. Awarded the only knockout (technical) of the evening, Kolczynski simply shrugged his shoulders. He had knocked out 37 of his 65 previous opponents, had beaten the champions of Norway, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Denmark, Finland and Eire.

In the heavyweight division, last event on the program, Cleveland's hard-hitting Negro Dan Merritt, Golden Gloves and A. A. U. champion, lost the decision to Germany's 200-lb. Herbert Runge. The defeat did not seriously affect the Chicago team standing because it had already clinched victory with a score of five bouts to two, but it dimmed the prestige of Negro Merritt, who hoped to pile up as impressive a record as one of his predecessors, Joe Louis, who won the Golden Gloves championship in 1934.

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