 This is Jimmy Powers, ready to bring you another story from the Tumult and the Shouting. Again, this is Jimmy Powers transcribed with another chapter from the Grantland Rice story, The Tumult and the Shouting. Last time we took Gene Tunney straight from a bookkeeper's job in downtown New York to the heavyweight championship of the world. Today we take a second look at Tunney, the Tunney of the celebrated Long Count fight at Chicago in 1927. So, with a salute to the every young spirit of Granny Rice, I take up his autobiography, The Tumult and the Shouting, and in first person, pick up the narrative. The second Dempsey Tunney fight in Chicago, exactly one year later, was pretty much a repetition of the first, except for that Long Count. There's an old saying that champions never come back. They all but had to bury that old truism that night at Soldiers Field before 104,943 who had paid $2,658,660 to see the bomb go off. It was Tunney's first defense of his crown. As for Dempsey, he'd chipped a lot of rust off his plates two months earlier against Jack Sharkey. There was never a more popular underdog than ex-Champ Dempsey going into the second Tunney fight. With old timers, whether it be baseball players or fighters, the ability to hit goes last, and Dempsey could still hit. At Chicago, it seemed that everybody and anybody short of President Coolidge was calling the shots and throwing coal on the fires of intrigue. The fight was made to order for Chicago, a boom city that was busting its britches with prosperity and the honky-tonk that goes with it. In 1927, the sports world wore seven league boots as Babe Ruth boomed, it's great to be alive and a Yankee. And the Babe was spearheading the greatest of all Yankee teams to the American League pennant and a clean sweep over Pittsburgh in the World Series. That year, Ruth blasted his Homeric mark of 60 home runs. Tommy Armour, the silvery scot with the deadly long irons, won the U.S. Open, and Bob Jones reclaimed the amateur title. Lindbergh took his big hop to Paris, and the French won the Davis Cup from us, and the USA didn't get it back for 10 more years. Tony did his training at Lake Villa, Illinois, while Dempsey pitched camp at Lincoln Field's racetrack outside of town. Meanwhile, the whole world started to descend upon Chicago. Even Al Capone seemed lost in the crush. On the afternoon of September the 22nd, George Whiteside, Tony's lawyer, and Leo Flynn, Dempsey's legal mind, met at the Illinois Boxing Commission offices to clear up the knockdown rule once and for all. It was firmly agreed to by both parties that the fighters scoring a knockdown shall immediately go to the farthest neutral corner and wait there until signaled by the referee to resume hammering his man, or words to that specific effect. That night, every name sportswriter in the United States, plus a huge assemblage of foreign newspaper men, were at Ringside, along with 104,943 other paying guests. Never again will I witness the mass of seething humanity that jam soldiers' field. Typewriters snarled their keys, endeavoring to outdo the next machine with bombastic descriptives and double superlatives. As clean-shaven as Tony in that first fight at Philadelphia, Jack reverted to his old custom of entering the ring with three days' growth of black beard. He was tan as a month of work under a hot sun could bake him. Tony, by contrast, was pink and white with white trunks. Dempsey wore black trunks. The betting was even money. The first six rounds were a repetition of the Philadelphia fight. Tony boxed beautifully, his straight left jab and combinations jarring Dempsey, but not hurting him particularly. I was thinking of my overnight lead in the seventh when, lo and behold, Dempsey landed a right cross over Tony's left lead. It landed like a bomb on the left side of Tony's jaw. The lights in Tony's mind flickered as a second right to the jaw knocked him into the ropes. As Tony came off the ropes, clearly dazed, Jack caught him with a short and crucifying left hook, then a right, a left, and a right. Tony was down on the canvas, his left hand clutching the middle rope near one corner. Dempsey landed six or seven punches. Had Tony enjoyed anything less than 100% physical condition, he would have been out at the count of 20 or 30. In the space of two seconds, soldiers' field became a brain bedlam. As Tony hit the deck, referee Dave Barry signaled Dempsey to that farthest neutral corner. His mind set on just one thing, the final and utter destruction of Tony. Jack moved straight ahead to the corner where the battered Tony lay and stood behind him, his arms on the top rope. Barry charged Jack, grabbed him around the waist, and pointed to the opposite corner. Then Jack moved. 20 seconds elapsed between the time that Tony fell and Dempsey reached that far corner I'll never know. I do know that when Barry started his count and reached seven, Tony was on one knee, listening attentively, and was up at nine. A tiger flew at Tony. But Gene, already an almost complete command of his faculties, backpedaled and circled out of range until his head had completely cleared. That was Dempsey's last chance, the only round of the 10 I could score for him. Tony defended his title once more in New York against a tough but inept Tom Heaney, whose arms that night didn't seem any longer than a seal's flippers. I felt the natural follow-up would have been Sharky the Sailor against Tony the Marine, but that's water over the dam. Directly following the Heaney pushover, Gene retired to the life of a country squire, with a beautiful bride, Polly Louder, daughter of a steel family. Now this is Jimmy Powers again, and today with me is Gene Tunney, the one-time heavyweight champion of the world who retired undefeated. Gene, I got a kick out of Granny Rice's association with you in his great life story, The Tumult and the Shouting. Do you remember that first meeting with Granny in the press box at the Polar Grounds? Yes, indeed I do. So, Wall of Trumbull brought me up, and I was much surprised to see people like Hayward Brune, Groudon Rice, and one or two others of the great famous baseball riders of that era. What was your first impression of him when you first met him? He was the most friendly sort of person. Gene, how did you get in prize fighting? What motivated you towards fighting? Well, when I went into the Marine Corps, I won the boxing championship of Paris Island. After going overseas, I went into the inter-allied games, and as a representative of the Marine Corps, I won the light heavyweight championship of the AEF. And when I came back, I had no job, so I thought I might try my hand at professional boxing. What was your hardest fight, Gene? My first fight with Harry Greb in the old Madison Square Garden. I went 15 rounds. It was a bloody contest. Gene, how much of that long count in Chicago do you actually recall? Oh, I recall practically the whole count. That is, from the time the referee said two on the second count. He didn't start counting actually until Jack went to the neutral corner, and then when he said two, I was looking up at him. I could have gotten up earlier, I think. What do you think now was the cause of that knockdown? Was it that the ropes were closer than you realize? No, carelessness. Carelessness. One place in the world not to be careless, particularly against a fellow like Jack Dempsey. Have you ever subsequently disgusted privately, I mean, or is this the first time on the air that you've disgusted? Have you ever had a heart-to-heart talk about that fight? With Jack? Yes. No, not quite. No, I think there are certain things about the contest, about the conditions that we wouldn't discuss. We just, Jack, and I just take it as having been a fight that we were in, and we got finished with, and as far as he's concerned and I'm concerned, it's all over. Well, I know it's a very gallant thing for Jack to say, for instance, that long count was the greatest thing that ever happened to him. I, as a sportswriter, find that hard to believe. It's much better to win the championship back, and Jack will never convince me that that isn't the way he really felt. How do you really feel about it? Do you think that was the greatest thing that ever happened to Jack? Well, in a sense it was. Jack was not too popular with the people, but after that contest, majority of the people thought that Jack had been robbed, and nobody could, nobody was more worthy or deserving of the sympathy of the whole nation than Jack. Gene, you look in pretty good shape, and you've got wonderful color, and how do you keep in that shape? What are you doing there, physically, in the business world? Well, I'm doing, physically, I played golf yesterday. That's the reason my face is sunburned. But in the business world, I have a number of interests. I'm a director in seven or eight corporations. Then you're not out on the golf course as much as you'd like to be? Well, I only get out there about twice a month now. How about tennis? Do you sell play tennis? I play tennis still, yes. Gene, when was the last time you saw Granny Rice? I had lunch with Tim Cohane and him at the hotel, Chatham. We talked of old times, as we always did, and he told me that he was doing a book, which he hoped that I would be pleased about during an article or a chapter on me. And I asked him what's going to be the name of it, and he said he didn't know yet, but he kind of liked the title, the tumult on the shouting. Good. Well, thank you very much, Gene. You're very welcome. Folks, that's it for today. Gene Tunney, it's been great reminiscing with you about Granny Rice, and thanks for dropping in. Now, this is Jimmy Powers transcribe saying, so long until next time.