I heard that he had a real close fight with a 6 fight Joe Louis. His career went down south after that one though. Anyone know what kind of style he had? Was he considered a prospect at the time?
Even though he was from Green Bay, I think of Waiter as being the up and coming fighter out of Chicago in the early thirties, kind of a successor to the Kingfish. I view that era, especially, as the era of the local fight clubs. Just as people in Chicago (for example) would see a baseball game they would go out on Fridays and see the local prospects and every city had them and many of the sports fans of the era knew them, the local papers would cover them the way that they cover pro teams of the city or nearby college games. I think Wiater was the guy on a local level at the time and I think even at that time, Louis was making a name for himself at some of the same venues that Wiater fought at. Blackburn had wanted to take Louis out of Detroit, so Chicago, being the second biggest city in America at the time, was the logical place. In order to make a name, they signed to fight Wiater. Of all the Louis fights, I would love to see this one the most, this and Perroni. From what I have read, Wiater was one of the few people who ever drew blood from Louis and had him hurt in the middle rounds. Louis showed heart here and came back to win the last three pretty decisively. Louis went on to take on top ten guys by the end of the year, Wiater went on to be knocked out by Leo Lomski only two years later and retire.
He was a strong, tough man who crowded Joe all night. I suspect that he would not allow punching room enough for the inexperienced Louis to draw a bead on him and he supposedly bloodied Joe and not a little --Joe had to rally over the last three rounds to clinch the decision.
