Old Missoula

M Club Meet Has Colorful History

Boxers who tangle in the M Club tournament as an extra feature of Interscholastic Friday night will be vying for the Billy Merritt Memorial trophy, to be awarded to an outstanding competitor for the fifth time.

From 1926 through 1952 the M Club awarded a “best boxer” trophy. Starting in 1953, the trophy was named for Billy Merritt of Missoula, a former M Club boxer, who was killed in Korea on Dec. 29, 1952.

Tournament managers looking back through the records found some formidable fighters. In the early 20s the tournament was sponsored by the “Good Eats Club” to raise funds for Grizzly training tables. Bill Kelly, Les Tarbet, Wild Horse Rafferty, Joe Cochrane, Billy McFarland are some of the names recalled from those days.

The tournament was first designated as an M Club event in 1926, when McFarland won the trophy. In subsequent years, some of the standouts among title winners, not all of them trophy winners, were Bud Grover, Jimmy McNally, Clarence Muhlick, Rip Lewon, Deane Jones (a three-time winner), Frank Curtis, Hub Zemke, Chuck Gillogly (a double winner), Abe O’Hearn, Whitey Rosman, Bob Frazer, Lee Cork. Last winner of the M Club trophy before it became the Merritt Trophy was Chuck Bradley in 1952.

Only during World War II was the tournament suspended. Back in the 30s, an annual State Intercollegiate Minor Sports meet also was conducted, matching the best Grizzly boxers, wrestlers and swimmers with Montana State College athletes. The meet was revived for a few years after the war.

Probably the greatest boxing team the Grizzlies ever put together was in 1931. Its members often met foes two weight divisions above them without losing a bout. George Haney, now superintendent of schools in Butte, was a lightheavy but won the state heavyweight title. Cale Crowley, Billings lawyer, cleaned up on the lightheavys, Eddie Krause (the only ringer on the team) met welters and middleweights, and Jimmy McNally could handle any welterweight. Bud Grover, little over the lightweight limit, bounced welters off the canvas. Deane Jones, boxing anywhere from 118 to 135, handled the lighter divisions. Of that punching crew, Jimmy McNally is dead, killed on Okinawa in the waning days of World War II, Grover operates a drug store in Deer Lodge and Jones is city editor of the Missoulian-Sentinel.

So this year’s boxers have something to shoot at when they enter the ring. Previous winners of the Merritt Trophy are George Tarrant, 1953; Marston Holben, 1954; Howard Johnson, 1955, and Montana Bockman, 1956. The last two are in this year’s tournament.

The above article appeared in The Daily Missoulian on May 12, 1957

 

M Club Tournament Merritt Memorial

The annual M-Club boxing tournament at the State University, for the first time in the history of the event, will be dedicated as a memorial affair this year. Club officers have announced that the fistic event will be dedicated to William James “Billy” Merritt in memory of his fighting heart and competitive spirit. The bouts are slated for Thursday, Feb. 19. “M-Club members who knew Billy and those who know his brother, Bobby Sparks (1951 basketball co-captain), felt that in this way they could pay their respects to Billy,” Bob Antonich, general fight manager, said. “Billy participated in the tournament two years, and in 1951 he won a scrappy fight which helped Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity retain the team trophy.”

On December 29, 1952, Billy lost his life in the front lines as a United Nations soldier in Korea.

Club members have also stipulated that this year, and in years hereafter, the outstanding trophy shall be presented as the “Merritt Memorial Award” for outstanding boxing.

Merritt was born April 13, 1929, attended Missoula grade schools, and was graduated from Missoula county high. He participated in American Legion baseball, 1945-46, and later played with the Bonner Lumberjacks and other independent teams. He entered the University as a freshman in 1950, majoring in physical education, then joined the army in Nov. 1951.

Tentative plans for this year’s tournament call for 12 bouts, 3 in the heavy-weight division; 3 light-heavy; 4 middle-weight; and 2 welter-or light-weight.

Proceeds from the fights each year go to buy equipment for the University’s training room. Last year the M-club bought two rehabilitation machines. This year they plan to buy a quick-ice machine – a portable rig for treatment of fresh injuries.

Besides University students who will enter the fight, the M-club hopes to have fighters from Hamilton, Ronan, and possibly Butte.

Club members in charge of this year’s affair are; Antonich, formerly of Butte, now of Great Falls, general manager; Bob Graves, M-club president, Billings, chairman; Don Gerlinger, Bob Lamley, Don Orlich, Horold Maus, and Joe Roberts, and Jim Burke.

The above article appeared in The Missoulian on February 3, 1953.

 

Walter “Blackie” Wetzel

One of the more colorful University of Montana boxers from the 1930’s, Walter S. Wetzel, from Cut Bank, fondly remembered one of his bouts with a George Letz from Conrad. Although he stood 6 foot 3, Letz lost the bout to the more experienced “Blackie” Wetzel, who had been a champion boxer while attending Haskell Institute in Lawrence, Kansas.

Letz did not stay at U of M very long – after a short stint he moved on to Hollywood and a more lucrative career as the actor, George Montgomery. George Wetzel, later president of the National Congress of American Indians, was the father of U of M basketball’s Don Wetzel who played 4 years in the 1960’s, and later founded the Montana Indian Athletic Hall of Fame.

 

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