"Money Ain't Everything"

Even at 32, a little past his prime, Joe Louis was still too good for his own good. There wasn't an able-bodied challenger in sight. And Big Joe's top-heavy expenses went on & on.

In Detroit alone, for a time he had supported 27 relatives. The phlegmatic, and always proper, big fellow the photographers and white folks saw was not the Joe Louis that Harlem knew. Away from his own people, he was always conscientious about being a credit to his race. Harlem knew him as a man sometimes angry and sometimes moody--but also a fellow who could relax, laugh his head off, throw expensive parties. He was the softest touch in town. His friends told him that hangers-on sometimes "borrowed" up to $50 from Joe's pants while he was taking a bath, but Joe didn't seem to mind. Said he: "Money ain't everything, unless a poor guy ain't got it." Once when a crony told Joe that he wanted to put on an all-Negro show, Joe reached mechanically for his checkbook, asked his friend, "Will $1,000 do?"

In twelve years in boxing's big time (ten years as heavyweight champion) Joe has grossed $2,815,000. Taxes have taken a lot, but so has his investing: everything he has touched (notable exceptions: his annuity and three Chicago apartment houses) seemed to turn to red ink. Among others, there was the Brown Bomber softball team ($30,000 loss), a Detroit restaurant called the Brown Bomber Chicken Shack (about $15,000), a Michigan dude ranch ($25,000), and his flyer last fall in West Coast pro football ($7,500). He gets about 350 fan letters a week, mostly from women, and mostly wanting money.

Six weeks ago, Joe's handlers, unable to find him someone to fight, got to thinking of all the unexplored territory outside the U.S. where people might pay just to see Joe flex his muscles. Joe put on his best deadpan mask for the benefit of strangers, and headed for Latin America. At Mexico City, in an exhibition, he carefully pulled his punches for ten rounds against Arturo Godoy, who had once lasted 15 rounds in the ring against Joe. Both got booed (fans who knowingly pay to see an "exhibition" hopefully expect to see a fight), but Joe got his $50,000 guarantee.

Last week in Godoy's native Chile, Big Joe boxed him again. This time he hit so hard that it ceased to look like an exhibition. Twice, Godoy's knees turned rubbery and he sank to the floor. He was so groggy by the second round that he accidentally landed a haymaker on the referee, Argentina's onetime wonder, Luis ("Wild Bull of the Pampas") Firpo. Said Joe Louis' business manager contentedly, after picking up another $15,000 for a night's work: "Should we decide to go to Australia and Europe, Joe will wind up with a half million dollars in exhibition purses which, of course, is not hay."

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