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A new book about Howard Darwin opens with an exquisite description of the day his mother died. It was July 10, 1937, a hot one, and his life was about to forever change.
Alerted to trouble during a basketball game, he charged home breathless that day, into his older brother’s arms. Their mother, Marie but called Mayme, was lifeless in bed, aged 47. He remembered forever this detail: a stray cat had wandered into the house on Nicholas Street and was lying on Mayme’s chest.
He was six years old.
The Ten Count, written by Howard’s youngest son, Jeff, contains many fully drawn episodes from the life of Ottawa’s most eclectic sports entrepreneur, who died in 2009 at 79. But the recurring theme is that his childhood — spent in relative poverty, with a distant, alcoholic father, and on the wrong side of the tracks (nicknamed Skid Row) — forged his ambition, his risk-taking, his combative spirit, but his humility, too.
The Ten Count by Jeff Darwin.
The highlights of Darwin’s professional life are well-known: founding role with the OHL’s Ottawa 67’s, one-time owner of the London Knights, pioneer of Triple A baseball in the city with the Ottawa Lynx, a boxing promoter — both live and in closed-circuit broadcast — a wrestling impresario, a jeweller.
Much less known are the stories that were his foundation. Later in life, Darwin liked to dress well, wear shiny shoes and drive a big luxurious car, as though over-compensating.
This might be why. At age seven, he applied to be the exclusive newspaper dealer at the naval defence building downtown. He was to make a pitch to the vice-admiral. But what to wear? He borrowed a pair of oversized woollen trousers, wore his Toronto Maple Leafs sweater and, for shoes, relied on slip-on toe rubbers held onto his sock feet with elastics.
Of course, he got the job.
Within two years, he was selling more than 1,000 papers a day (oh, make a newsman’s heart soar!) at three cents a piece. He was earning close to $10 a day while in Grade 3. He later spoke of it as the best job he ever had.
He would experience heartache. Howard was very fond of his older brother Jack, who had joined the army and spent close to five years overseas. A telegram arrived on Jan. 23, 1945, close to war’s end. Sgt. Maj. John (Jack) Joseph Darwin was killed in action in Holland.
Word did not arrive like it does in the movies, Jeff writes, with some kind of unsmiling honour guard. “There were no soldiers in uniform, no Army Chaplain and worst of all, no support of any kind for 14-year-old, devastated Howard Darwin.”
Jeff Darwin.
Darwin never liked school much. When he turned 16, he visited the principal’s office at St. Patrick’s High School “to sign himself out of class — forever.” Grade 9 would have to do.
The book traipses through the history of Ottawa for the past 80 years. The railway tracks by Union Station, the Albion Hotel, the Standish, the old Aud, Mackenzie King in all his weirdness (after training as a watchmaker, Darwin fixed clocks at Laurier House), Charlotte Whitton, Claude Bennett, Brian Kilrea, even John Diefenbaker.
For old Ottawa hacks, it is the city’s family album: Earl Montagano, Joey Sandulo, Gale Kerwin, Doug “Pops” Thompson, Len Trombley, Gord Hamilton, Eddie MacCabe, Jack Kinsella, Jim Durrell, Larry Kelly — a roster of wags, old sports, and parlour wits.
Some of the stories are just kooky. Darwin once promoted a wrestler who fought hand-to-hand with a bear. Ah, but where does one keep the headliner overnight? He put Yogi in his garage — to the displeasure of a bylaw cop. There are howlers about Sky Low Low being hung out the window of a moving car and André The Giant taking over the kitchen at the Diamond Bar-B-Q.
As a businessman, he was a risk-taker, meaning his hunches were sometimes prescient, sometimes poopy. He was an early investor in cable television, for instance, and made a pile in real estate. On the hand, he backed a promising boxer named Conroy Nelson, a magnificent-looking man who did brilliant things in the ring, except hit people.
“Conroy had everything going for him. All he needed was a heart transplant,” Citizen columnist Wayne Scanlan memorably wrote in 1993.
“Some people go to the track and play the horses,” responded Darwin. “I had Conroy. It was an adventure.”
Wasn’t it just: Howard Darwin, all 15 rounds, beating the 10 count till the final bell?
(For info, www.thetencount.ca)
To contact Kelly Egan, please call 613-726-5896 or email kegan@ottawacitizen.com.
twitter.com/kellyegancolumn
查看原文...
Alerted to trouble during a basketball game, he charged home breathless that day, into his older brother’s arms. Their mother, Marie but called Mayme, was lifeless in bed, aged 47. He remembered forever this detail: a stray cat had wandered into the house on Nicholas Street and was lying on Mayme’s chest.
He was six years old.
The Ten Count, written by Howard’s youngest son, Jeff, contains many fully drawn episodes from the life of Ottawa’s most eclectic sports entrepreneur, who died in 2009 at 79. But the recurring theme is that his childhood — spent in relative poverty, with a distant, alcoholic father, and on the wrong side of the tracks (nicknamed Skid Row) — forged his ambition, his risk-taking, his combative spirit, but his humility, too.
The Ten Count by Jeff Darwin.
The highlights of Darwin’s professional life are well-known: founding role with the OHL’s Ottawa 67’s, one-time owner of the London Knights, pioneer of Triple A baseball in the city with the Ottawa Lynx, a boxing promoter — both live and in closed-circuit broadcast — a wrestling impresario, a jeweller.
Much less known are the stories that were his foundation. Later in life, Darwin liked to dress well, wear shiny shoes and drive a big luxurious car, as though over-compensating.
This might be why. At age seven, he applied to be the exclusive newspaper dealer at the naval defence building downtown. He was to make a pitch to the vice-admiral. But what to wear? He borrowed a pair of oversized woollen trousers, wore his Toronto Maple Leafs sweater and, for shoes, relied on slip-on toe rubbers held onto his sock feet with elastics.
Of course, he got the job.
Within two years, he was selling more than 1,000 papers a day (oh, make a newsman’s heart soar!) at three cents a piece. He was earning close to $10 a day while in Grade 3. He later spoke of it as the best job he ever had.
He would experience heartache. Howard was very fond of his older brother Jack, who had joined the army and spent close to five years overseas. A telegram arrived on Jan. 23, 1945, close to war’s end. Sgt. Maj. John (Jack) Joseph Darwin was killed in action in Holland.
Word did not arrive like it does in the movies, Jeff writes, with some kind of unsmiling honour guard. “There were no soldiers in uniform, no Army Chaplain and worst of all, no support of any kind for 14-year-old, devastated Howard Darwin.”
Jeff Darwin.
Darwin never liked school much. When he turned 16, he visited the principal’s office at St. Patrick’s High School “to sign himself out of class — forever.” Grade 9 would have to do.
The book traipses through the history of Ottawa for the past 80 years. The railway tracks by Union Station, the Albion Hotel, the Standish, the old Aud, Mackenzie King in all his weirdness (after training as a watchmaker, Darwin fixed clocks at Laurier House), Charlotte Whitton, Claude Bennett, Brian Kilrea, even John Diefenbaker.
For old Ottawa hacks, it is the city’s family album: Earl Montagano, Joey Sandulo, Gale Kerwin, Doug “Pops” Thompson, Len Trombley, Gord Hamilton, Eddie MacCabe, Jack Kinsella, Jim Durrell, Larry Kelly — a roster of wags, old sports, and parlour wits.
Some of the stories are just kooky. Darwin once promoted a wrestler who fought hand-to-hand with a bear. Ah, but where does one keep the headliner overnight? He put Yogi in his garage — to the displeasure of a bylaw cop. There are howlers about Sky Low Low being hung out the window of a moving car and André The Giant taking over the kitchen at the Diamond Bar-B-Q.
As a businessman, he was a risk-taker, meaning his hunches were sometimes prescient, sometimes poopy. He was an early investor in cable television, for instance, and made a pile in real estate. On the hand, he backed a promising boxer named Conroy Nelson, a magnificent-looking man who did brilliant things in the ring, except hit people.
“Conroy had everything going for him. All he needed was a heart transplant,” Citizen columnist Wayne Scanlan memorably wrote in 1993.
“Some people go to the track and play the horses,” responded Darwin. “I had Conroy. It was an adventure.”
Wasn’t it just: Howard Darwin, all 15 rounds, beating the 10 count till the final bell?
(For info, www.thetencount.ca)
To contact Kelly Egan, please call 613-726-5896 or email kegan@ottawacitizen.com.
twitter.com/kellyegancolumn
查看原文...
