"Male athletes—what good are they?"

JANICE TAYLOR

A retaliatory composition in which the female of the species is a hundred times more deadly than the male

EDITOR'S NOTE: Janice Taylor, who has written Male Athletes— What Good Are They? in reply to Paul Gallico's vitriolic attack on athletic ladies published in the May issue of Vanity Fair, is the daughter of a Kansas City surgeon. She has worked on newspapers throughout the middle west, as sob sister, feature writer and book reviewer. She is an accomplished pianist, golfer and aviatrix and was the first woman to fly from London to Addis Ababa, nearly losing her life when she crashed on landing. She has a villa in Mentone, France, and is an indefatigable traveler on the Continent and in her native America.

The dullest evening I ever spent in my life was yawned away in the company of a Harvard football captain, until the night I dined with a golf professional who talked to me about his shirts, and what he would have done in England, if he could have kept sober. This remained a new high until I met successively a ball player, a hockey player and a prizefighter. The ball player took the prize for sheer stupidity, the prizefighter kept reiterating that no one could knock him out, and the hockey player, a keen looking devil with an appealing profile, became very drowsy at half-past nine and had to be sent home. I am afraid that athletic gentlemen bore me.

I am, in common with many of my sisters, not insensible to the charms of a good mussing-up at the hands of an attractive brute with wavy hair, stubble beard, and an irresistible pair of forearms. In fact one of the high spots in my rather turbulent career was the evening one May at a country club in Cleveland when I was snatched violently to the enormous chest of a prominent lightheavyweight prizefighter who snarled— "Gawd, I get a bang out of you, baby. You're different. I getta bang out of you, baby. Baby, you give me a great bang. I get a bang out of you baby." However, it became apparent almost immediately that these were practically all the words he knew in any language, and I began to worry about how he got along, say on a railroad train, or a barber shop, or when he wanted a couple of soft boiled eggs. I can remember only his hurt and amazed expression when, as we parted he said—"Baby, don't you get a bang out of me? Honest, I get an awful bang out of you, kid. I'm surprised you don't get a bang out of me."

My social and business contacts with prominent athletes have also convinced me that they are largely a collection of good-natured imbeciles, beautiful and dumb public gladiators who should never be permitted to doff their tennis flannels or football suits or other picturesque costumes, and attempt to mingle on terms of equality with intelligent people.

The vanity of any prominent athlete is insufferable, his prevailing topic of conversation is his physical condition. He tells you either that he is feeling great, never felt better in his life, or that there is something the matter with him (he doesn't just know what), and that it is worrying him because he never had anything the matter with him before.

I have at one time or another conversed with Gene Tunney, who talked about himself; Charles Paddock, who talked about himself; Benny Friedman, who talked about himself; Mickey Walker, who was slightly intoxicated, but still able to talk about himself; Hack Wilson, who talked about himself; George Voigt, who talked about himself; Walter Hagen, who talked about himself (but managed to be reasonably entertaining about it); William T. Tilden 2d, who did not talk about himself, but instead talked about his tennis, his acting and his writing; Primo Camera, who would have spoken about himself if he could have talked English; and who promptly did so when I switched to Italian, and with Max Schmeling, who also was better able to do himself justice in his mother tongue.

■ There was a quarterback at Ohio State I could have loved. He had straight black hair, a thin nose, and a wide mouth that broke into a slow, amused smile, and he spent three evenings trying to teach me the signals, so that I could be the only one in the stadium besides himself who would know what play was coming—if and when I could hear the signals. I went to the game with a red-haired Junior who was five feet six, had blue eyes and freckles, and never did anything more strenuous than play bad golf. He held my hand and said—"Honey, damned if I can look at that football game till I find out the color of your eyes. No, it isn't the color. It's those disturbing lights in them—hazel and gold, gold that's been in the sea a long time."

I didn't look at the football game either. . . .

I have been told that athletes are a great boon to the nation and that the race is more or less dependent upon them to keep up the physical standard, provided worthy mates can be secured, but a brief survey conducted especially for this article has failed to reveal that there ever was an athletic god who amounted to anything in after life, nor have I discovered any case where one of his brood was rushed off to the White House or was around pushing President Angell for his position as Headman at Yale.

■ The eugenic triumph of the uniting of a heavyweight champion prizefighter and a millionaire's daughter is still apparently awaiting the say-so to Mr. Walter Winchell for confirmation or development. The nation's greatest bully, John L. Sullivan, contributed (God be praised) no replicas of his boozy self; the most boring fistic exhibition I have ever been dragged to while being wooed iperiodically by an impecunious sports editor in Kansas City had as one of its exhibitors a baldheaded, fat, slow-motion picture known as Young Bob Fitzsimmons, who was, I was told, the son of the famous fighter of another era, and that once happy union between Jack Dempsey and Estelle Taylor, two strapping creatures, is apparently not to be blessed.

While my records are still incomplete, I have at the present time no evidence that any cabinet members, or presidents of motor car companies, or financial geniuses, or leading scientists ever resulted from the union of a pitcher with a soubrette or a halfback with a stenographer, or a Davis Cup player with an Olympic breast stroke swimmer. True, old time football players seem to produce more football players whom they send back to the same universities, but this is only a vicious circle, and as far as I am concerned may be discontinued any time because a football player automatically becomes one of the stupidest creatures in the world. Gerry Farrar's father was a baseball player, which I will admit as evidence that the exception has something to do with making the rule look good....

A six foot oarsman, fullback or high jumper makes a fetching ornament for a girl, and goes well with a fur coat or a new hat, but for utilitarian purposes I notice that the wiser sisters annex some pert little fellow with a sense of humor, who isn't in training, who hasn't spent all of his spare time hurling himself upon a stuffed figure, running around in circles, or doing setting up exercises, and who therefore isn't perpetually tired, and has time to acquire a knowledge of what is going on in the out side world. He can dance all night, and, since his body does not belong to Alma Mater he has no conscience to bother him. While the big numb. skulls with the limousine bodies are knocking one another down in the mud and covering themselves with gore under the impression that they are making themselves attractive to us, these same medium sized parties who do nothing more violent than play bridge or week-end tennis, are escorting us to the games, entertain ing us while the heroes are being tucked into bed at night by their trainers or coaches or whoever per forms this tender function, and are marrying us upon graduation and keeping us in automobiles, lingerie and Chanel, by making the ex-athietes work for them.

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Whereas the average college, athlete is only a bore, the professional hero is often a boor as well.

There is fortunately no room to dwell upon the horrible embonpoints, swellings and balloonings that over take, somewhere in the roaring forties, those athletes who have had to give up being strenuous and heroic in favor of earning a living. They become paunchy, triple chinned and loggy, for ever reminding one of their better days and forever promising they will get in shape again, some day. . ..

They are all quite all right in their places, footballers and baseballers, and runners and swimmers and box ers, and rowers and jumpers. . . They are picturesque, and they do exciting things when the bands play, but, when all is said and done, just what good ARE they?