I was Tex’s confidant in several of his boxing deals and I spent many hours with him about this time. Shortly after the Carpentier-Dempsey bout was made, orders started to pour into Tex’s office. Mike Jacobs, later Rickard’s successor as monarch of the fight game, was in control of the ticket sales, and he turned most of the tickets over to the agencies. The demand for ducats was so big that Tex could take nothing but cash or certified checks. Without putting down a cent of his own money, he constructed the huge arena in Jersey City known as Boyle’s Thirty Acres and still had enough to pay Dempsey and Carpentier their guarantees a week before they entered the ring. But it was a tremendous gamble, for if anything had happened to the fighters, Tex would have had to beat it out of the United States. He had little money of his own at the time and it would have been impossible for him to make a 100 per cent refund if the fight had been called off. Tex worried over this huge outlay when he started the promotion and bemoaned the fact that he had planned the arena with 60,000 seats. However, once the money started coming in, he knew he was clear as long as nothing happened to the fighters. I recall meeting with him and Mike Jacobs on an interview for a Sunday yarn. Asked for a rundown on the seating arrangements and the ticket sale, Tex hesitated, then replied: “I have 60,000 seats. I was worrying how we could get that many folks to come to the show, but Mike and I are now trying to see how many more seats we can put into the arena. We’re being flooded with requests. But I don’t want to say nothin’ about that in the paper, Nat. I’ll give you a good story, but it’s for the speculators who are grabbin’ all the ringside seats.” With that he told me how he put one over on them. He released a story to the effect that because of the run on his ticket offices, he had received permission from the Jersey City authorities to extend the arena stands and to add 30,000 seats to its capacity. The ringside seats, he informed the press, had been sold out during the first ten days, and to take care of the many requests that were piling up at his headquarters, other ringside sections were being built. The specs fell for that story and another wild rush was made for the ringside seats, the choicest of which Rickard had already allotted Uncle Mike because of the financial aid Jacobs had given to launch the promotion. When, at the last moment, the speculators found themselves stuck with many unsold ducats, Tex and Mike laughed. “Let them worry, it’s their headache now,” was Rickard’s comment. Rickard’s good angel smiled again and the take amounted to $1,789,238, the first million dollar gate in the history of pugilism! * * * * *