TURK SAT ON ROEBER AT ACADEMY OF MUSIC
Was Dreaming of Castles in Turkey When A Policeman Jarred Him.
Originally Published In The Brooklyn Eagle, May 25, 1901, Page 8.
Something like three thousand New Yorkers were separated from their money at the Academy of Music last night, as the result of a wrestling bout that bore all the ear marks of a fake. Gothamites have had similar experiences in the past, lots of them, but they go up against the same old deal repeatedly and with the same apparent innocence.
All the promoters have to do is to drop the game for a time and then suddenly produce a pagan wonder from the Sultan’s domain or Cherry street and the public tumbles over itself in its eagerness to give up its hard earned dollars.
Last night’s affair was no exception. Nouaulah, who, like the lamented Yousouf, had gathered up enough American dollars to buy castles in Turkey, was booked to sail for home to-day, so his mentors got up a farewell performance, in which the Turk was to throw Ernest Roeber three times within the hour at Graeco-Roman wrestling.The Turk knew nothing of this style and, after working for twenty-six minutes without making an impression on his opponent, the pagan calmly sat on Roeber’s face and dreamily built castles in the air under the warm sun of the ottoman Empire.
The yells of Referee O’Donnell and the spectators woke him not and it was not until the thump of a policeman’s club jarred his cranium that Nouroulah came back to earth and asked his interpreter what had happened.
Roeber got from underneath and escaped through the ropes and the bout ended with the referee announcing the American victor on a foul because the Turk had grabbed his opponent below the wais, something that is forbidden in the ethics of Graeco-Roman wrestling.
There is a law against sitting on a opponent’s face, but that is in the code of humanity and the Turk knows nothing of that. The crowd departed, swearing never to be taken in again, a customary cry, but the way.
Roeber pocketed the receipts and a contract to go on the road as the only wrestler who defeated Nouroulah and the latter said goodby preparatory to sailing for home today. Then the lights went out.
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