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Its a good read(seriously)
Schmeling?s 1960s account given, straight from the heart, in front of Duncan?s cameras, of how he did, at long last, become the friend of the American he thrashed and who then thrashed him, says more than I could ever say to justify the hardest game.
?It was about l954 and I was in Milwaukee and I thought it was about time, after all the years, that I met Joe and I found out he was in Chicago and got given the address. Any way, when I get to the house the maid opens the door and tells me that Mr Louis is out playing golf but he?ll be back in a while.
?So it?s not much more than half an hour when the front door opens and Joe comes in and he looks at me and looks at me. Then he puts down his bag, his golf bag, and he walks over. And I said I wanted to see him for so long and hoped he?d never taken account of some of the things that got printed, got put in the papers when we fought those two times.
?Joe shook his head and he put his arm around my shoulder and he keeps shaking his head and holding me. And then he starts to cry. And I, I started to cry, too. Well, as you know, we became friends, him taking me straight out to a favourite restaurant of his where it happens I was the only white man in the place. And later he came more than once to stay with me in Germany, him showing me his golf he loved so much. But the two of us talking, talking together for hours like the friends you can become through sport.
? What Schmeling did not like to talk about was the fact that more than once he paid Louis?s hospital bills when the Brown Bomber, short of money and owing thousands in back tax, became ill. When Louis died, aged 55, in April l981, his former opponent privately sent a cheque towards the costs of the funeral. Publicly, with no children of his own to back financially, Max set up a charitable foundation in his own name which was to raise hundreds of thousands of Deutschmarks for the poor and elderly and other good causes.
?That?s my hobby,? he laughed, ?making money with one hand and giving it away with the other.?
Schmeling?s 1960s account given, straight from the heart, in front of Duncan?s cameras, of how he did, at long last, become the friend of the American he thrashed and who then thrashed him, says more than I could ever say to justify the hardest game.
?It was about l954 and I was in Milwaukee and I thought it was about time, after all the years, that I met Joe and I found out he was in Chicago and got given the address. Any way, when I get to the house the maid opens the door and tells me that Mr Louis is out playing golf but he?ll be back in a while.
?So it?s not much more than half an hour when the front door opens and Joe comes in and he looks at me and looks at me. Then he puts down his bag, his golf bag, and he walks over. And I said I wanted to see him for so long and hoped he?d never taken account of some of the things that got printed, got put in the papers when we fought those two times.
?Joe shook his head and he put his arm around my shoulder and he keeps shaking his head and holding me. And then he starts to cry. And I, I started to cry, too. Well, as you know, we became friends, him taking me straight out to a favourite restaurant of his where it happens I was the only white man in the place. And later he came more than once to stay with me in Germany, him showing me his golf he loved so much. But the two of us talking, talking together for hours like the friends you can become through sport.
? What Schmeling did not like to talk about was the fact that more than once he paid Louis?s hospital bills when the Brown Bomber, short of money and owing thousands in back tax, became ill. When Louis died, aged 55, in April l981, his former opponent privately sent a cheque towards the costs of the funeral. Publicly, with no children of his own to back financially, Max set up a charitable foundation in his own name which was to raise hundreds of thousands of Deutschmarks for the poor and elderly and other good causes.
?That?s my hobby,? he laughed, ?making money with one hand and giving it away with the other.?
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