Keeping Fit U.s. Using The 'Little Guys' To Keep Military In Shape

The great heavyweight fighter Joe Louis once embarked on what was called his "Bum of the Month" tour.

This meant that once a month, or more often, Louis would slap around an unknown pug who wasn't really tough enough or skilled enough to be in the ring with him.

He did it because there were so very few fighters really worthy of fighting Louis.

So, to make money in those pre-TV days, stay in shape, and remind the sporting world that he was the best, Louis took on whomever was available.

He fought more than 100 such fights in places like Topeka, Kan., Waycross, Ga., Odessa, Texas, and Moline, Ill.

Because his opponents were such second-raters - who ever heard of Sugar Lip Anderson? - the fights weren't even official title bouts. They were labeled as exhibitions.

But the crowd had a good time. And the local fighter would be able to brag that he once had the honor of being knocked senseless by Joe Louis.

It seems to me that this country has found itself in a position similar to that of Joe Louis.

Just as Louis had the physical ability to demolish anyone who challenged him, we have the military power to do the same.

We could, if we wished, blow up the entire world and everybody on it, including ourselves. Or we could single out one small part of the world and just erase it.

Who is as strong? The Soviet Union, maybe. But it's not convenient for either of us to settle the question. At least not at the moment.

As strong as we are, though, there seems to be a need in many of us to remind others of our strength. And to remind ourselves.

That's why there was such heartfelt pride and jubilation when we roared into Grenada and defeated a swarm of Cuban construction workers.

And it's the reason there's almost unanimous support in Congress, and probably among the American people, for the way we zapped those Libyan patrol boats last week.

The appealing thing about both these adventures is that they aren't really full-scale wars, which we don't want to get involved in right now.

We're calling the Libyan action a "confrontation." I don't recall what we named the Grenada invasion.
In that way, they're similar to Joe Louis' "Bum of the Month" fights, which were pushover exhibitions. The patrol boats from Libya were pushovers, as were the construction workers on Grenada. There's no risk of our losing, and they serve as military exhibitions.

When you think about it, we said we sent our planes over the Gulf of Sidra as part of a military exercise. What better exercise could there be than actually sinking a few patrol boats and bombing a couple of radar sites?

So, what I'm suggesting is that President Reagan give some thought to adopting the old Joe Louis "Bum of the Month" tour as part of our national policy.

Moammar Khadafy surely isn't the only national leader who has been making a pest of himself. And Libya isn't the only relatively small country that's been unfriendly to us.

Look at a map of the world. They're all over the place. You can't even pronounce many of their names, the foreigners.

I'm not saying that we should just go in and start shooting missiles at them for no reason. Nor should we do anything to provoke them into attacking us. As Larry Speakes, the White House spokesman says, that's not why we went into the Gulf of Sidra. We just needed the exercise. And in this fitness- conscious age, who would deny us our exercise?

But I'm sure there are a lot of little countries who, if we gave them an opportunity, would be willing to do something to provoke us. That's all those pugs were doing when they climbed in the ring with Joe Louis taking advantage of a rare opportunity to go up against the best.

What did it cost them, really. A few cuts and bruises, and a broken nose maybe, all for a lifetime of memories.

And what did it cost Khadafy? A few small boats. A few missiles. A few dozen of his citizens. All for the acclaim of his Arab friends and the world's many crazies.

So I think President Reagan, whether he knows it or not, is on to something that could become quite popular - his version of the old "Bum of the Month" tour.

The crowds will love it. But as a natural-born crowd pleaser, I'm sure he already knows that.

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Joe Louis Walker plays it his way

Joe Louis Walker, the mighty modern electric and acoustic blues guitarist and singer, appears this weekend at Warmdaddy's in South Philly.

"You know, I like to think of myself as a chameleon," Walker says. "When I picked up the guitar as a kid, I picked it up to be a guitar player - not a blues guitar player."

Walker, born in San Francisco, started playing in churches starting at age 8. "Church was where me and my cousins gigged, where we had to play everything from Junior Walker and the All-Stars to sacred songs to the blues," he says. "The hippies came to my neighborhood, so I got a little of that, too. It was the whole combination of things there."

In 1968, he met up with Chicago guitarist Mike Bloomfield and became his roommate, confidant, and drinking partner. "His sound was one worth emulating," Walker says. Of Bloomfield's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he says, "It was long overdue, that honor."

Bloomfield's death in 1981 shook Walker, who "got off the treadmill," leaving the music scene. In the following years, he freed himself from drugs and drinking. He attended San Francisco State University and got a degree in music and English. "Education was a wonderful thing," he says. "Still is, as I'm never without a book."

He performed holy songs with the Spiritual Corinthians Gospel Quartet in the Bay Area. "There are a lot of negative forces out there," says Walker. "I watched it happen to so many good ones. I played gospel music exclusively for a time, and that became part of my diet. I love jazz, soul, and R&B and play jazz, soul, and R&B. Then there's rock. I do it all."

By 1985, Walker decided to return to the music life. He began to make records that prove him adept, fluid, and fierce on both acoustic guitar and electric. He's an emotional player and vocalist who reinvents the blues with each record. That includes 1986's Cold is the Night, the 1998 sociopolitical classic Preacher and the President, and the soon-to-drop Everybody Wants a Piece.

That new album has raw, righteous songs such as "Black & Blue," a mix of roadhouse blues, deep funk, and raging, ringing, harmonious rock.

"Hey, man, I put on John Lennon records in the morning and Muddy Waters records at night," Walker says with a laugh. "That's who I am and what my music is."

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Joe Louis Biography

The world heavyweight boxing champion from June 22, 1937, until March 1, 1949, Joe Louis held the title longer than anyone else in history.

Synopsis

Born on May 13, 1914 in Lafayette, Alabama, Joe Louis went on to become the heavyweight champion of the world. Known as the Brown Bomber, Louis held the belt for nearly 12 years, a boxing record, and posted 25 successful title defenses.

Early Years

Boxer. Widely considered one of the greatest and most beloved boxers in the sport's history, Joseph Louis Barrow was born May 13, 1914 in the cotton-field country near Lafayette, Alabama. The son of a sharecropper, and the great-grandson of a slave, he was eighth child of Munn and Lilly Barrow.
Louis's family life was shaped by financial struggle. The Louis kids slept three to a bed and Louis' father was committed to a state hospital when he was just two years old.
Louis had little schooling and as a teen took on odd jobs in order to help out his mother and siblings. The family eventually relocated to Detroit where Louis found work as a laborer at the River Rouge plant of the Ford Motor Company.
For a time Louis set his sights on a career in cabinet making. He briefly attended the Bronson Vocational School for training and in his off-time took violin lessons.  But it was while at school that a friend recommended he try boxing.
While not an immediate success—he debuted as a lightweight and was knocked down three times in his first fight—he showed promise. By 1934 he held the national Amateur Athletic Union light-heavyweight title and finished his amateur career with an astonishing 43 knockout victories in 54 matches.

Pro Career

Louis bruised his opponents with a crushing left jab and hook. By the end of 1935 the young fighter was showing that his amateur success was no fluke. He fought 14 bouts that year, earning nearly $370,000 in prize money.
On June 19, 1936 Louis suffered his first professional defeat, a 12th round knockout to Max Schmeling, a German fighter and former heavyweight champion who'd earned the adoring praise of Adolph Hitler.
The defeat stung Louis, but it was offset by the chance to fight Jim Braddock on June 22, 1937 for the heavyweight crown. The Brown Bomber, as he came to be known, knocked out the defending champ in the eighth round setting the stage for a 12-year-run as the heavyweight king all the while becoming a sports icon for blacks and white across America.
Part of it could be chalked up to the sheer fact that fans loved a winner. Of Louis' 25 title defenses, only three went the full 15 rounds. But in winning, Louis also showed himself to be a gracious, even generous victor. Louis, who enlisted with the army in 1942, threw his support behind the country's war effort, and went so far as to twice donate his purse money to military relief funds.
He officially retired on March 1, 1949. A short-lived comeback, owed more in part because he was broke, soon followed. But Louis failed to capture his earlier magic. On October 26, 1951 he called it quits for good after Rocky Marciano knocked him out in the eighth round at Madison Square Garden.

Post-Boxing Life

The years after his retirement from the ring proved uneven for Louis. He was still a revered American figure, but money was a constant issue for him. In an effort to find some footing he tried out a number of careers. He wrestled and partnered with a rival in setting up a chain of interracial food shops.
In 1970 his wife Martha committed Louis to a psychiatric hospital in Colorado because of his cocaine addiction and paranoia. He was later confined to a wheelchair following surgery to correct an aortic aneurism.
When he passed away from a heart attack on April 12, 1981, Louis, who married four times in his life and had two children, was working as an "official greeter" at Caesars Palace.
Louis was inducted to the Ring Magazine Boxing Hall of Fame in 1954 and the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990. In 1982 he was posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

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