Toothpick Kelly

doing a bit of reading about big the 6 ft 6 240 pounder from the 1900s.

Here is an interesting story about him being slapped by his manager spider Kelly.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...elly&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&index=8

This one is intriging a little, because it matches the Toothpick with Kid Carter, when he was an undefeated promising fighter. Not sure if this actually took place.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...elly&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&index=8

The toothpick does seem to have been well beaten by Mcvey.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...lly&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&index=12

Here it seems that McVey actually derailled a likely toothpick Kelly Jim Jeffries title fight from eventuating. It might have actually been an interesting name for Jim to have on his resume. Certainly better than Finnegan.
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...lly&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&index=13

 

here is the fight report from the McDonald fight which seems to have been the Toothpicks last reported fight. Incidentally, McDonald went on to be arrested for Robbery, for anyone who is interested.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=2&index=0

and here is another version of the fight.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=2&index=10

This article is about Jess willard, not the toothpick and it does consider Jess taller than toothpick, but it is interesting none the less.

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=2&index=12

 

It says 6 6 in one of the earlier ones. I am guessing that 6 4 might be a bit more realistic actually.

By the way, it seems strange that the toothpick disappeared with such an imposing record of early KOs, with his huge size and of course with him being white. It seems that the reason might have been because he took fits because of a military injury.

http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=NZTR19070302.2.15.5

 

Thanks for that. That does have some excellent information. Some of those rumoured stories were interesting. It seems the Toothpick might have a bareknuckled fight victory over Van Buskirk. It is a shame that he seemed to have got involved in the Marijuana, and one would have to guess that this would not have helped his career, and may have even cost him more.

I think that there might have been some potential there, and the McVey lost was definitely forgiveable, although obviously it seems that his career didnt progress. Interestingly, it mentions quite a lot of additional fights. I am not sure whether there was an additional fight with McDonald winning a rematch or not. ONe of the reports I read last night referred to this, but i think it was wrongly referring to toothpick's win over McDonald, because it seems unlikely that such a quick rematch could happen without more publicity. Still, it is definitely posssible.

By the way, this article refers to Toothpicks opponent McDonald being murdered, not the toothpick himself. Still, One of the aritcles i posted which was just after his last reported fight on Boxrec did refer to Toothpick as the Late Toothpick Kelly, so i am not sure if he met a premature end or not.

All in all, that was an excellent read and thread on that other forum.